


Poisoned

by irishgirlE



Category: Charmed (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2019-03-19
Packaged: 2019-06-21 23:20:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 30,771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15568584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irishgirlE/pseuds/irishgirlE
Summary: Chris is left injured after a demon hunt. Leo is tasked by the Elders to make sure it doesn't kill him. Of course, things are never easy for witch-lighter out of time. Secrets, plots and grudges only complicate things.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For future reference, I've decided that Chris' Bad Future is 2025 - I don't know if it's said anywhere in the show so that's what I've decided. Melinda, PJ, Kat and Tamora are 18, Henry Jr. is 17 and Matt is the Manticore Baby all grown up.

Chris groaned, orbing into his room in P3. He pressed a hand to the shallow wound on his arm. A demon had gotten in a lucky shot.

  
"What sort of demon carries a bow and arrows?" He muttered, bitterly.

He shouldn't have been caught like he had.

If he had still been in his own time something like that would have gotten him killed. It could have still gotten him killed.

Chris missed his family and friends – even if their friendships were strained – more than anything. If he been at home, with them, he would likely have had to sit through an hour-long lecture about how 'that could have been a dark lighter,' and 'do you have death wish, Chris?'

At least he would have had someone watching his back. He would have had someone to heal him or help him clean himself up.

Chris would have even accepted Leo's help right then – either Leo. He was just so tired. He was tired of being hated. He was tired of lying. He was tired of killing demons. But people were counting on him. Mel, Parker, PJ, Henry Jr., Daryl Jr., they were all counting on him. Even Cole was counting on him, and he had been the most against it.

Chris was too tired to try and avoid thinking about all the people who he used to be able to add to that list, but he couldn't any more. _Bianca. Mikey. Uncle Coop._

He sighed. Chris was too tired to be awake. It was in that strange time where it was both too early, and too late.

He just wanted to stop his arm bleeding, sleep, and then sneak back into the Halliwell house and steal some of their first aid supplies. They hardly ever used them, they didn't know that this was something he did incredibly often.

Chris groaned as he pulled off his demon bloodstained jacket, the motion pulling at his aching muscles. With his jacket off, he was able to peer his injury. He was glad that it seemed to be bleeding a lot less.

He wasn't likely to die of blood loss in the night.

With many more sighs, yawns and groans, Chris hunted down a clean bandage and tied it around his arm.  
He gratefully sank into the lumpy cushions of the couch that he had claimed as his bed. He dragged the blanket that Phoebe had given to him – it was entirely out of pity, but Chris was grateful for the kindness.

The thought that maybe he should have cleaned his arm before bandaging it never crossed his mind.

* * *

  
"Leo."

"Sandra." Leo greeted, smiling at the Elder who had greeted him. His smile quickly faded at her worried expression. "What's wrong?"

Sandra frowned. "There has been a great upheaval in the underworld. Someone has been killing countless demons."

"That's good, right?" Leo answered, confused.

"Yes, but," Sandra sighed, "we have traced this disturbance but to the Charmed Ones' white lighter, Chris Perry."

Leo frowned. Normally he would enjoy any attempt to discredit Chris but, "that's his job, isn't it? To kill demons. He is trying to keep my son safe." He reminded her.

Leo may have many problems with Chris, but he knew he was incredibly serious about saving Wyatt. He just wasn't very good about being nice about it.

"Yes, it is his job. I have nothing but good things to say about his dedication to his charges, your son included, it's his dedication to himself that I'm worried about."

"What?" Leo replied. "What dedication to himself?"

Sandra sighed. "That's just it, Leo. He pushes himself very hard. Many white lighters have come with worries from their charges and themselves about Chris. He doesn't seem to socialise with others, and he doesn't always get on with his charges." She sighed again. "He goes up against several demons, alone. It has reached me that a witch has had a vision about this being his downfall."

"You're saying that Chris will get hurt if he doesn't stop going out alone?" Leo answered. Chris was a very competent fighter. Leo doubted Chris had ever gotten seriously injured in a fight. He was an adult, and Leo wasn't his father. He couldn't stop the witch lighter from going to the underworld. He didn't really want to either.

Leo had problems with Chris, but he was good at what he did. Chris enjoyed what he did. They were finally at a place of, if not friendship, peace. He didn't want to damage that by coming down on Chris' head, saying that he couldn't do his job.

"Leo, I'm saying that Chris has already been hurt." Sandra said, cutting through his thoughts. "It's only a matter of whether it will kill him, this time."

Leo frowned. _This time?_


	2. Chapter 2

Chris lay his head down on his arms. The smell of the vomit in the toilet beneath him was disgusting but he couldn't find the strength to move.

He had no idea how long he had been asleep for before he was woken up by his stomach trying to escape through his mouth. He couldn't tell how long he had been curled around the toilet, either. He just knew that he was too tired, too aching and too hot to crawl back under his blankets.

Well, he was too hot at the moment, sometimes he was too hot and sometimes he was too cold.

His arm was throbbing and when Chris had checked under the bandage, and triggered another round of vomiting, he had seen a black, spider web crawling out around the dark wound. It was disgusting. And, Chris knew, it didn't bode well for him.

He could hear the sisters calling out to him, but he was just so tired. They sounded irritated, and then more and more worried. If he could, he would have been more concerned. Right then, he was content to leave their problems to Leo.

Chris rose to his knees only to find himself immediately over the toilet again. He kept heaving long after his stomach was empty. He was coughing up blood by the end. He was sure he should be worried by that. He stared at the lumpy mess for a moment before spitting at it, trying to clean the taste out of his mouth.

Chris groaned, and his head flopped back to his arms. He could still taste the vile taste of vomit in his mouth, but he was tired. Chris closed his eyes.

Leo was calling him now. Chris didn't want Leo. He didn't want to be in the past anymore. He just wanted his mother, or his sister. But neither of them were here, not really. 

"Leo," he croaked.

If he wanted his sister to be born, he had to make sure he didn't die before he could get his parents back together. He needed Leo for that.

Chris nearly sobbed when he didn’t hear the familiar sound of orbing. His dad had let him down again, it seemed. And he didn't even know that it was his son that he was abandoning this time. Maybe it was karma, Chris guessed. Maybe he had failed in trying to save Wyatt, and now, because of that, he was going to die curled up in a dirty bathroom. He had committed the unforgivable sin of not succeeding to save the precious Twice Blessed Charmed Child. But then, this would be the pathetic fate of the useless second son of a Charmed One. 

With a sigh, Chris slipped off to oblivion.

* * *

 

Leo had been somewhat ashamed when he realised that he had no idea where Chris liked to spend his time. He wasn't at the Bridge, he wasn't at the house and Leo wasn't even going to try looking in the depths of the Underworld.

He had orbed to the house hours ago. He had spent most of the night pacing, waiting for one of the girls to wake up. He had hoped that one of them might know where Chris would go.

Leo hoped that, whatever had happened to Chris, he had been able to orb out of the Underworld. He just didn't know where he could be.  He had checked his room in P3 and Leo knew Chris had been there recently. He didn't know when exactly. Chris could have been there last night or even minutes before he got there.

At seven o'clock, Leo gave up waiting for the sisters to wake up and shook Piper awake. She had been as annoyed as he had suspected she would be. And, after a twenty-minute-long, loud scolding, she had only gotten angrier when Leo had told her that something was wrong with Chris.

"What? What, Leo? What has Chris done now?" She snapped, irritably. The long hours of being a single, working mother were not agreeing with her temperament at the moment.

Leo silently resolved to sneak down and stay with Wyatt more. Piper definitely needed more sleep. "The Elders told me – "

"Uh, what have the Elders said  _ now _ ?" Paige groaned, shuffling downstairs in her pyjamas.

Phoebe followed close behind. Both of them looked like they had been woken up from a deep sleep, and they were clearly annoyed about it.

Leo waited until the girls were all sitting around the kitchen table, glaring at him. Except Phoebe, who looked somewhat sympathetic. She could probably sense the worry and unease that must be pouring off of him.

Now that she was more awake, Piper also looked concerned. Not that it dulled her annoyance.

"The Elders told me that Chris has been vanquishing a lot of demons, recently – with and without you. They're concerned that he's doing it alone."

"Leo, we have lives," Paige reminded him. "The kid has a serious obsession with demon hunting. Every day, he had more and more demons for us to vanquish. We want to help him, I mean, he's trying to save Wyatt, but I don't think anyone can handle as many demons as he wants us to."

Leo felt his unease rising. Had Chris been hunting demons 24/7? Was he alone against demons so often because the sisters refused? He couldn't deny that Chris had an obsession but was it better to leave him to it or to join him?

"Did the Elders say anything else, Leo?" Phoebe asked.

"Or did you just wake us up for nothing?" Paige groused, without any actual annoyance.

"Um, actually Piper woke you up with…" Leo trailed off at the glare Piper was giving him. It didn't really hurt when she blew him up, but it certainly wasn't pleasant. "Apparently, a white lighter has warned the Elders that their charge had a vision about all the demon hunting killing Chris. They think that he's already been injured, that he needs help."

"What was he doing hunting demons in the middle of the night!?" Piper exclaimed.

"I don't know," Leo shrugged. He had had that same thought many times throughout the night. "But I don't know where he is."

"Well the sooner we find him, the sooner I can get back to sleep," Paige said, grinning. She jumped to her feet. "I'll start scrying, someone else start calling him, and someone else make me some coffee."

Phoebe yawned and turned to the coffee maker. "I'll make coffee."

"Did you check P3?" Piper asked.

Leo nodded. "He wasn't in his room, or on the Bridge." He frowned.

"And he's not here," Piper summarised. She sighed. "You watch Wyatt, I'll try calling him." She ordered, shuffling back up the stairs.

"You're worried about him?" Phoebe guessed, leaning against the counter-top.

"Should I not be?" Leo asked.

"I'm worried about Chris," Phoebe assured him. "But I'm more worried about why the Elders told you that Chris was hurt. It's worrying that it took someone else, someone who didn't know Chris, to tell us that something was wrong with him." She smiled, sadly. "Chris seems to be very important, but not to us."

Leo said nothing. It was strange that the Elders had known Chris was in trouble. Especially before the sisters did.

"I think we need to start paying more attention to him," Phoebe sighed. "When we found out that he was half-witch I had just hoped that he looked young. But I think he really is just a neurotic young man. And I think we need to look after him, like he tries to do for us, for Wyatt. He came back to save Wyatt from evil, but I think that's going to end up killing him faster than his future ever could."

Leo nodded. "I want to try look out for him more, but I'm not his father. I can't tell him what he can and can't do."

Phoebe shrugged. "You're an Elder. We're his charges. Between us, I think we can trick him into staying alive."


	3. Chapter 3

"Phoebe!" Piper called, carrying Wyatt downstairs.

Leo and Phoebe rushed to meet her.

"Did you find him?" Phoebe asked.

"No, but do you still have Chris' shirt?" Piper wondered.

Leo frowned, staring between the pair. "What?"

Piper rolled her eyes. "Chris sneaks in here and uses our first aid supplies sometimes. He left a shirt here the last time." She explained. "Phoebe was supposed to give it back to him," she added, with an accusing look. 

"Well it's a good thing I didn't," Phoebe defended.

"How many times has Chris come here needing help?" Leo wondered.

Piper shrugged, shifting Wyatt carefully. "He comes at night, we're not sure how often he did it before we noticed."

Leo pushed down the rising feelings of guilt, reminding himself that Chris wouldn't go to someone for help even if he felt like it would be given freely.  _ That doesn't mean it shouldn't have been offered. _

Phoebe patted his arm. "I'll go get the shirt. Piper, why don't you bring Paige her coffee?" She suggested, giving Piper a look before starting up the stairs.

Piper huffed. Annoying empath. She frowned at Leo's troubled expression. "Chris wouldn't ask us for help, Leo. He won't ask anyone. You know that," she reminded him.

"Are you saying we shouldn't help him?" Leo asked, surprised. He had never thought that Piper could be so cold.

"No. I'm just saying we shouldn't blame ourselves. If Chris asked for our help and we refused him that would be different. But we didn't," she argued.

Leo guessed she wanted to say more but Wyatt started crying. He leaned out for his father, whimpering. Leo took his son, smiling down at his little angel. "You'll always ask for our help if you need it, won't you?" He said, bouncing Wyatt, making his giggle.

Piper smiled. "We're not Chris' parents, Leo," she replied. She sighed. "I'd better bring up the coffee."

Leo smiled sadly at Wyatt's smiling face. He couldn't believe that his little boy could ever be in any danger of evil. But he didn't believe Chris was lying. He didn't believe anyone would ever put themselves through so much for a lie. Or for a stranger.

He suspected that Piper felt the same way about Chris. Whoever he was, he clearly cared about their family.

Paige frowned at the scrying crystals. "Why are you being so difficult?" She growled at the crystals.

"Will this help?" Phoebe asked, handing her a shirt.

Paige shrugged. "Have you tried calling him? I'm not very hopeful about this.," she admitted holding up the shirt.

Phoebe nodded. "Chris!" She called.

"Chris!" Paige joined in.

They both waited for a moment, sighing when nothing happened.

"Ask Piper to call him," Paige suggested. "He always comes when she calls."

"He doesn't _always_ come," Piper argued, walking into the attic. "You're welcome," she muttered, when Paige snatched a cup of coffee out of her hand.

"If he doesn't come when you call, then he's just ignoring us," Paige said, ignoring Piper.

The girls began calling Chris, getting more and more worried when he didn't appear.  Leo watched the trio, anxiously. Even Wyatt seemed worried about him.

"He'd at least come to tell us to knock it off," Paige said, looking anxiously between her sisters.

"Maybe he didn't hear us," Piper guessed but she didn't look like she believed that. "Maybe he  _ can't _ hear us," she said, more to herself.

Suddenly, Leo could hear something. He turned away from the sisters and listened.

"Leo?" Piper called, worried and hopeful.

Leo shushed her. He had to strain his ears but then he heard it. _Chris._

"Can you hear him?" Piper asked.

Leo ignored her and handed Wyatt to Paige. He didn't bother to tell them about hearing Chris, but he guessed they knew that's what he heard. Phoebe, who was closest, latched onto his arm before he could orb away to Chris.

"It's bad, Phoebe," he pleaded for her to let go.

Phoebe met his gaze with a glare that Leo only thought Piper and Grams could give, daring him to try knock her off. He didn't.  He sighed and orbed.

* * *

 

Chris wasn't awake, but he wasn't asleep either. He was in some strange in-between state where he could distantly perceive the world around him but not entirely understand or interact with it.

He was woken up by the familiar sound of orbs. He groaned as he heard his aunt's shrill voice calling his dad. He didn't need them right now, he was trying to save the future.

Chris felt something chilled pressed against the back of his neck and then along his forehead. It felt amazing against his burning skin. Even if the cold things were trying to pull his head up. He was dizzy enough when he was lying down, did he really have to get up?

It was only through sheer stubbornness that he didn't end up face down against the toilet again as he was dragged onto shaky legs. He felt incredibly weak.

The Resistance would have to leave him behind. They didn't have enough white lighters left to come save him. He would just dehydrate in an abandoned house or end up being caught by Wyatt. It had happened to plenty of people before. Chris knew the reasons for it. He had become desensitized to the death of his friends and allies. He had stayed with Daryl Junior until he had finally died after a series of fever induced seizures from an infected wound.

Then Wyatt had found him. He had found himself wishing that he had just left Daryl Junior behind. He had died anyway, Chris had nearly died, and, in the months, he had been missing, over half the Resistance had been slaughtered.

"C'mon Chris, work with me," his dad begged.

No. That wasn't right.

He was in the past. Leo wasn't his dad yet. Piper wasn't his mom. But he was still dying. Chris knew the feeling.

He was pulled against a warm, steadily moving, upright surface. An arm was pressed against his chest, holding him to the surface. Chris panicked.

He could feel the air being pressed out of his lungs. There was a vice around his chest. Chris could hear his name being called but he ignored it, instead attempting to drag air into his straining lungs.

It must be Wyatt. Wyatt was choking him. He liked to do things like that to Chris and the others.

Chris could feel himself leaving the strange in-between place he was in and slipping down into unconsciousness. The last felt was his dad's hands and the sensation of orbing.

* * *

 

Leo and Phoebe orbed into Chris's room. Leo was confused. He knew he had heard Chris call him from here, but he had checked here last night.

"Leo!" Phoebe called, pulling away from Leo and moving into the tiny bathroom. She hovered for a moment, uncertain, before crouching down and pressing a hand on the back of Chris's neck.

Chris was slumped against the toilet seat, flushed and panting. The smell of blood and vomit hung in the air. Phoebe could tell that he had a high fever. She pressed another hand against his forehead, flinching at the heat. How could he have gotten this bad so quickly? She had seen Chris only two days ago and he had been fine, running off to kill more demons.

Phoebe pulled Chris's head away from the disgusting mess in the toilet.

Leo quickly moved in beside her and slipped his hands up Chris's arms. He pulled him to his feet, despite Chris's legs threatening to drop the whole time.

Chris groaned and tried to pull away even though he obviously would have fallen. He mumbled something about leaving him behind.

"C'mon Chris, work with me," Leo begged.

"Dad," Chris groaned.

Leo ignored him as he succeeded in dragging Chris to his feet. He pulled Chris against him, bracing him with an across his chest.

He glanced into Chris's room, trying to see if there was anything he should get for Chris.

"Leo!" Phoebe called, she had Chris's face in her hands.

Leo didn't understand until he heard how fast and shallow Chris's breathing had become. His struggle to escape restarted, only more uncoordinated than ever.

"Chris, breathe!" Leo ordered, sounding more desperate than authoritative.

His heart sank as he realised that Chris was quickly losing consciousness, falling heavier in his arms.

"We'll get him to the house," Phoebe decided, quickly. "You can heal him there."

Leo nodded. Inside, he wasn't very optimistic about being able to heal Chris. If it was that simple he imagined the Elders would have sent another white lighter. If it was that simple, Chris wouldn't be this bad off.

Leo could hear Piper calling him, demanding that he come home and tell them what had happened to Chris. She demanded he bring him to the house.  Leo sighed. He knew Piper didn't want to see Chris in such a worrying condition, but she was adamant, already arguing with him before he was there to argue back.

It was only a second until they were back in the house and Chris had been orbed to their couch.  Leo hovered over the white lighter, hands extended for healing.

"He doesn't look good," Paige commented, bouncing a crying Wyatt.

"What's wrong with him?" Piper demanded.

"I don't know," Leo admitted with a sigh. His healing wasn't working. He looked up and down Chris's sweat soaked skin, spotting a seriously infected wound in Chris's bicep. "He's sick," he added to Piper's question as he prodded at Chris's arm.

He was discouraged by Chris not even flinching. The wound looked bad and Leo was beginning to suspect something more than a simple injury was causing this.

"I think he's been poisoned." 


	4. Chapter 4

_"I think he's been poisoned."_

There was a moment of stunned silence before Piper moved.

"Do you know how he was poisoned?" She asked, moving to Chris and pressing a hand against his forehead. She frowned.

"His arm," Leo answered. "He must have been stabbed or shot."

"A dark lighter?" Paige worried.

"No. I can't heal him. I've already tried."

"Has he been awake at all?" Piper asked.

"Yeah but he was…" Leo looked to Phoebe. He didn't know how to describe Chris' panic attack at P3.

"He was delirious, I think. He must have been hallucinating, he was scared," she explained, watching Chris sadly.

Piper nodded. "Right. Phoebe, can you go look for anything to help with his fever? Leo, orb him up to my room, it's the biggest. Paige, will you check the book for any demon poisons?"

For a moment, no one moved. They hadn't expected Piper to be so willing to help Chris.

"Go, people!" Piper ordered, loudly.

Phoebe and Paige went to do their tasks immediately, Paige handed Wyatt to Piper before orbing upstairs. Leo hesitated.

"Are you sure about bringing him up to your room?" Leo asked. "I could bring him up to the other Elders. They might have a better idea of what's wrong,” he suggested.

"Then go check with them after we have Chris settled," Piper decided, she didn't budge on the issue of Chris being in her room. "My room's biggest. And cleanest."

When Leo didn't look convinced Piper sighed. "He was hurt for our son, Leo. I feel guilty. We're all he has in this time, and, right now, he _needs_ us," she stressed. She wasn't sure where her sudden maternal feelings for Chris were coming from, but he did need her help and she wasn't going to let him down.

Leo relented, and he orbed away with Chris.

Piper looked down to Wyatt resting on her hip. She sighed again.

"What do you think, Wyatt? Does Chris need our help?" She asked, not expecting an answer from her baby boy.

Wyatt giggled when she said Chris's name, not yet understanding that something was wrong with his new friend. Ever since he had let his shield down around Chris he had become very fond of the witch lighter. He had even orbed from his mother's arms to Chris once. She had tried not to feel too offended, Wyatt didn't have very many friends after all.

Piper suspected that her new affection towards Chris was due to how much Wyatt liked him. And, of course, how much Chris seemed to enjoy playing with Wyatt.

* * *

 

Paige stared at the Book of Shadows. She rubbed her hands on her thighs, exhaling heavily.

If only Chris hadn't been poisoned, he loved looking through the book. He must know parts of it off by heart by now. He could at least give a description.

"Okay," she muttered. "Demons with arrows." Paige wasn't sure where she should start. She tried to think if she had ever come across any demons like that in the book. She wasn't even sure if it wasn't just a different type of dark lighter.

Suddenly a gust a wind blew through the room. Paige jumped back from the book as it flew open and the pages were flicked through.

The wind was gone as suddenly as it started. Nothing but the book had been moved.

"Thanks," Paige called, self-consciously. She wondered if it was Grams, or her mother, and why they had wanted to help Chris. Maybe they knew something she didn't. Chris must be very important if so many people wanted him to survive, Paige decided. The future must be pretty bad.

She peered into the open book.

"Archer Demons," Paige huffed. "Well, I could have figured that out." She muttered to no one.

Paige read the passage anyway. It _was_ helpful.

_Archer Demons use bows and arrows to dispose of their enemies. They often coat their arrows with a poison. This poison has many uses such as causing extreme fevers, violent seizures and vivid hallucinations._

Paige frowned. "Poor Chris," she sighed. There was no mention of a cure for this poison. She only hoped that there was, but if the poison wasn't even named then how could she find a cure?

Paige wouldn't want to be Chris's family. They sent back their son and brother to save their future and stop Wyatt. They would never know what happened to Chris, unless he failed. Chris didn't even know if he had succeeded already. He had saved her, but had that made a difference?

Had Chris ever mentioned his family? Paige wondered. Did he have any brothers or sister? Did he know them personally in the future? He _had_ said something about knowing them when the Stillman sisters had impersonated them, but did he really know them?

Paige removed her thoughts from the future that Chris had warned them about. She focused back on the passage in the Book. The next, and final, sentence gave her hope.

_Archer Demons tend to work for upper class demons._

She grinned. Paige knew what that meant. If they couldn't find a cure for the poison, then they could find a reason for the attack.

"Demon hunting."

* * *

_*Chris's Future*_

 

Melinda stared into space, worriedly chewing her lip as she waited for her potion to boil over.

Her companions – PJ and Parker, Kat, Henry Junior and Paige Matthews-Mitchell, and Matthew Pryce – all sat and stood around the small room. The youngest Halliwell cousins, Pearl and Peyton Halliwell, were outside, acting as their guards. There was an air of fear and tension among the family.

It was dangerous for the Halliwell children to be together for any length of time and it was even more dangerous to use magic while together. Even if it was only brewing a potion. Mel didn't feel right sitting and just waiting to be attacked at any moment. They were waiting for a visit from the few remaining Elders who weren't already down on the ground. Leo, their father and uncle, was one of them.

Almost as though thinking of him had summoned him, Leo arrived, alone. He ignored the young men and women in the room and instead instantly focused on Melinda.

"Mel," he greeted, warmly. Leo didn't get to see his children very often since they were always helping to lead the Resistance. He only really saw them when they were seriously injured, and not always then.

Melinda nodded, tersely. She didn't say anything. She hadn't forgiven her father for his lack of faith in her and Chris's worries about Wyatt or for his neglect of them in the past.

"What do you want, Leo?" Kat Mitchell snapped.

Paige frowned, and Henry Jr. reached for his sister, squeezing her arm in support and in warning.

"I think Kat means that it's dangerous for us all to be together," PJ explained, the most level-headed of her cousins. “Why did you want to meet us all?”

"It’s incredibly dangerous,” Parker insisted, running her hands along her bow. Her eyes darted from wall to wall as she sensed every magical being in the vicinity. "Especially so close to the Manor."

Leo nodded, tearing his eyes away from his daughter to stare at the most powerful members of the Resistance. "I know, and I'm sorry but I need to speak to all of you."

"It's about Chris, isn't it?" PJ guessed, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. "That's why the other Elders aren't here."

Melinda didn't know if it was PJ's empathy or her deduction skills, either way she knew that that was what her father wanted to talk about. Across the room from her, Matthew – Chris's current, and Wyatt's former, best friend – leaned forward, eyes burning holes in Leo.

Matthew had been against Chris going to the past alone and Bianca's death had not left him any more at ease.

Leo sighed. "It is. We've heard that a portal to the past – the same one Chris used – has been opened and closed recently."

"By who?" Mel demanded. She pushed away from the wall, towards her father. "Do you know?"

Leo shook his head. "I had been hoping it had been one of you."

"It was in the Manor, wasn't it?" Paige guessed, sadly.

"Yes." Leo answered, his was voice heavy with tears. He knew Paige's pain very well. Wyatt wasn't the only Halliwell who had chosen evil. It was either him or Tamora Mitchell, Paige's other daughter, that must have opened it. The only question was whether or not they went through it.

Melinda closed her eyes and tried to breathe through her closing throat. It was times like this that she regretted not having a way to talk to Chris. If something had happened to him, she would have no idea. Her brother might already be dead.

"He's alive, Mel," Matthew said without any hint of doubt.

While she had her eyes closed, Matthew had walked over to her. He reached out, took her thin hand in his rougher one and squeezed.

"We know he's alive. Chris is the strongest witch I know," he insisted, quietly, sincerely.

Mel smiled. She swallowed around the lump in her throat. Matthew was right, if Chris was hurt then she would know. She had always been close to Chris, even before everything went wrong. She had always known when he was in trouble no matter what it was.

Mel looked back to see Leo watching them both suspiciously. Maybe if she wasn't worried about Chris, Mel would be pleased by that. Her father had never taken an interest in her affairs before. He had no right to be all 'fatherly' now. Matt was more like a protector to her and Chris than Wyatt had been in years. She would probably never end up going for a relationship with Matt, but he was the only person she loved, or trusted, outside of her family enough to let her guard down.

"Do we have any idea what Wyatt might have wanted to do in the past? If he was even in the past?" PJ asked, seriously. She had hidden a smile when she watched her cousin, friend and uncle's interactions – most of them silent – but now the seriousness of the situation had taken over.

"Wyatt wouldn't leave his Empire," Parker answered. "I didn't feel his presence leave, anyway,” she added, with a sympathetic look at PJ, considering that her sensing powers were much stronger than her sister's. Even after the End of the World, the Halliwell Children still struggled with their inadequacies compared to each other. Parker opened her mouth to say something more, but stopped suddenly, gripping her head.

"Parker?" PJ worried, her hands hovering around her sister before she, too, grabbed her head. She cursed. "Tamora,” she gasped.

Melinda's eyes widened. "Where's Pearl and Peyton?" They had left the twins to guard the perimeter due to their heightened magical senses. If they hadn't tipped them off already then something was very wrong.

The door into their room flung open. Tamora stalked inside, she had one hand wrapped around Pearl's neck, and the other around Peyton's.

"Tamora!" Paige cried out, rising to her feet. Shock and fury fought on her face. She pulled PJ and Parker, who were still moaning in pain that Tamora had knowingly caused, behind her and towards Henry Jr.

Mel saw Mathew flex his hands out of the corner of her eyes. He couldn't grab his knife without drawing attention, so she knew he would have to use his shimmering and strength. Mel held her hands at the ready to freeze Tamora. She couldn't blow her up without hurting Pearl and Peyton.

Mel flinched at the crackle of lightning in the atmosphere as Leo let lightning spark from his fingertips. She grinned. Her father may not have been there for them in the past, but he had his powers now and she knew just how powerful they could be.

"Your choice, Tamora." Paige offered, fury having won out, "let them go, and live, or stay and die."


	5. Chapter 5

Mel was impressed. Aunt Paige was hiding her pain at having to attack her daughter incredibly well. She would have to ask her to teach her that for when she fought Wyatt. Of course, that assumed that they both survived this attack.

"Please," Tamora begged, surprising Mel. "Let me speak." Her brown eyes were full of sincerity for once.

Tamora stared at her mother, sister and brother, longingly, for a moment, before she met Mel's eyes.

Melinda realised with a start that, with Chris gone, and Matt being part-demon, she was the one her cousins looked to for leadership. Leo was no one’s favourite, and Paige usually stayed in the bases, healing their wounded and trying to teach magic so that Wyatt wouldn't win at wiping out good magic.

"Let Pearl and Peyton go," Mel answered. The coldness of her own voice surprised her. Maybe she wouldn't need lessons from Paige. "Then we'll talk."

Even without empathy powers, Mel could sense the surprise from everyone in the room when Tamora removed her hands from the twins. The twins didn't wait to run away from their cousin to hide behind Paige.

"Now?" Tamora asked. A little of her usual scorn seeping through.

"What do you want, Tam?" Kat snapped. She _ did _ need lessons from Paige when it came to hiding emotions, Mel mused. Kat had only stood, shocked when Tamora arrived. But she had found her voice now.

"It's Wyatt," Tamora began. "He – he's sent Ryake back to the past. He – Ryake – he says that he's gotten Chris. He says that…" Tamora stopped for a moment. "He says that Chris is going to die."

Mel froze. Ryake was Wyatt's top torturer, and Chris was his favourite victim.

"How?" Mel heard someone gasp, she wasn't sure whether it was her or someone else.

"Poison," Tamora answered, looking away. "Marbas poison."

Mel bit her lip. Death by Marbas poison was not a good death. If it was true, Chris would die screaming in agony after experiencing a long,  _ long  _ period of pain and suffering. It was forbidden, even in the underworld. Mel had no idea where Wyatt had gotten it.

"Why should we believe you?" Henry asked, his voice hard.

Tamora shook her head, tearfully. "I didn't want anyone to  _ die, _ " she hissed.

"That's never stopped you before," Matthew shrugged, carelessly. Tamora had been the one to hand his father over to Wyatt. She had done nothing when Derek had been used as a bargaining chip for Matthew to join Wyatt, and hand over Chris. She had done nothing when Wyatt had had his father torn to pieces in front of him.

Tamora flinched and her tear-filled eyes met Mathew's. "I never wanted  _ that,  _ Matt. I only ever wanted the family to be safe. I'm sorry," she apologised, begging for his forgiveness.

Matt looked away from her and Tamora turned to Melinda instead.

"Mel, Bianca was  _ pregnant _ . Wyatt killed his own family. He's gone mad since Chris rejected him."

Melinda ignored the ache in her chest at the mention of her former future sister-in-law. She hadn't known Bianca was pregnant, she doubted Chris had either. "Is Wyatt's sanity news to you?" She snapped.  _ Oh, Bianca, _ she grieved internally.

"What do you want us to do, Tamora?" Leo asked, his voice was somehow weary and hateful at the same time.

Maybe he hated how far their family had fallen apart as much as Mel did. Maybe learning that his son had killed his grandchild had finally convinced Leo that Wyatt was not worth saving at all.

_ Too little, too late, Old Man. _

* * *

Leo bit his lip, staring down at Chris's writhing body.

After being orbed upstairs, Chris had started whimpering and begging. Leo wasn't sure which was worse, the laboured breathing or the quiet calls for his mother, father and, sometimes, even Wyatt.

He didn't want to believe that Wyatt would ever do something like this, but he didn't believe that Chris was faking the level of fear whenever he cried out for Wyatt.

Leo pressed a hand to Chris's forehead to check his fever again. It didn't matter what his temperature was. Leo knew it was too high. He wasn't sure what else to do.

Leo knew it might be beneficial to take off Chris's sweat soaked clothes, but he didn't have anything to give him to where. It was would be easy to orb to P3 and grab something for Chris, but he was reluctant to leave him for any length of time.

"Your clothes are still in the dresser," Piper said, seemingly reading his mind. She stopped in the doorway and stared at Leo and Chris.

Leo wondered what she was looking at. He didn't think Chris had gotten any worse since he had orbed him upstairs. He went to pull out some of the pyjamas trying to avoid thinking about Chris's condition deteriorating. He had expected it to hurt to be reminded of when he and Piper had been together but the something about the situation had overshadowed it. Maybe it was himself and Piper working together. Maybe it was their shared position of trying to care for someone who was, basically, a rebellious child.

Piper sat Wyatt in the centre of the bed, at Chris's left side. Wyatt whimpered at Chris, sensing his discomfort. His tiny hands grasped Chris's shaking one.

"Wy…" Chris whimpered.

"Chri…" Wyatt squeaked in response. He moved a hand up to Chris's face. "Chriiisss,” he mumbled.

Piper smiled sadly at her little boy. "Good job, Wyatt,” she said, sorrowfully.

The cynical part of her hoped that Wyatt wasn't close enough to Chris that, if he died, he would miss him.

Leo gently nudged Piper out of the way at Chris's side. He slipped his hands under Chris's shoulders and heaved Chris up. Leo slid behind Chris, propping him up against his chest. Without Leo saying anything, Piper moved to Chris's lower half and began pulling off his shoes and socks. Working quickly, they were able to get Chris into new, clean clothes.

It was lucky Chris was unconscious, Leo thought. He was sure that the witch lighter would hate to been seen so weak and vulnerable.

"How old do you think Chris is?" Leo wondered suddenly. He pressed a hand against Chris's chest. He had seen the new bruises from demon hunting covering him. But he had also seen very old scars covering his back and shoulders. Chris seemed cynical enough to have survived through a war, but he didn't seem old enough.

"He's not born yet," Piper said, looking up at Leo. "He won't be until the end of next year."

"But when did he come from?" Leo asked.

Piper shrugged. "He said something about 2020 before. It must be after that." She took Chris's limp hand in hers. "He can't be old enough to drink."

"I've seen him drink before," Leo replied. He laughed. "I've actually seen him drunk before. And not from much."

Chris moaned. "Dad?" He called, weakly.

Leo sighed and brought his hand up to brush the hair away from Chris's forehead. "He's been calling for his parents for a while. Who do you think they are?"

"No idea," Piper answered. "He hasn't told me anything about them."

"I know he thinks his parents aren't proud of him. I know he doesn't get on with his father, he doesn't talk about his mom. I think… I think Wyatt might have…" Leo trailed off.

"No," Piper whispered. She turned to look at her little baby boy, sitting on the bed next to them, chatting at Chris and rubbing his hair like she did for Wyatt. She couldn't believe that he would ever grow up to kill somebody. "I hope his parents are proud of him,” she said instead. She couldn't imagine trying to help save the man who had killed her mother. "I would be, if he was my son."


	6. Chapter 6

“I want you to save Chris. Marbas is still forbidden in the past. They won’t know how to save him. They won’t even know who poisoned him because Ryake isn’t born,” Tamora explained.

“You want us to travel to the past?” Mel asked, dubiously.

“Tam, the only way to do that is from the Manor,” Henry Jr. reminded her, slowly. “It’s crawling with demons. And Wyatt.”

“And _we_ don’t know how to cure Marbas poisoning,” Kat said. “Or how to get _near_ the Manor.”

“But I know someone who does,” Tamora exclaimed, smiling deviously.

“Cole?” Mel guessed, taking Tamora’s smile as confirmation.

“Cole,” she confirmed out loud.

Matt sighed, and Mel rolled her eyes when they noticed Cole shimmer into the darkest corner of the room. They were used to Cole trying to make a dramatic entrance.

The four cupid-witches all sighed at Cole, as one.

For Cole to have been so on cue, he must have been listening in on their conversation from just outside. Half demon, constant turncoat and drama queen, Mel mused, but if anyone would know how to find the antidote to a long-forbidden poison it would be him.

Still, Mel scowled at the man. Cole was like an uncle to her, and like a father to Pearl and Peyton, but he had caused her family a lot of trouble in the past. “No offence, _Uncle_ Cole. But Aunt Phoebe and Aunt Paige, Mom and Dad would kill you the second you arrived.”

“I would have orbed you to Antarctica,” Paige agreed but she still walked over to Cole and briefly hugged him. Mel suspected that she was more grateful that Cole had helped Tamora than that he would help Chris.

“I’d use you as a little witch lighter shield if anything happened,” Cole offered, smiling warmly at Mel to take out the sting of his words.

Ever since Piper died, Cole had watched over her children. They had all grown into a strange friendship that they hid under death threats and violence. No matter what side Cole was working with, he had never hurt any of them. Even when he worked for Wyatt, he usually did more harm than good to his Empire – and everyone suspected it was on purpose.

“Do you have an actual plan?” Leo asked. “One that doesn’t involve using my daughter as a shield?” He suggested, good humouredly.

Cole laughed but his humour quickly evaporated. “Not here. I do have a plan. But with all of us in the same place we’ll draw some attention pretty quick.”

Leo nodded. “How about the Bay Mirror? Kevin has it protected, and it’s been left alone for months.”

“Dad, you go with PJ, Parker, Peyton and Pearl. Then Paige can take Henry and the twins, and we’ll go last, just in case orbing gets us any attention.” Mel ordered. She and Matt were the best hand versus magic fighters, but Tam and Kat would be best if they were caught while orbing. Leo was powerful enough to protect the cupids until PJ or Parker could get out their bows. Mel was surprised when no one argued. But people were used to be ordered by Piper and Chris over the years.

After a quick check of the perimeter confirmed that there wasn’t any scouts nearby, the cupids orbed with Leo. Orbing wasn’t as noticeable as beaming.

Mel returned to her original side of the room as her potion began to boil over onto the Bunsen burner flame. It was a bright pink now. It was supposed to be a dull yellow.

“Maybe PJ should be the one to brew the antidote for Chris?” Paige suggested, peering into the pot.

“Don’t worry, Mel will be my shield,” Cole reminded her, squeezing Mel’s shoulder.

“How about a glamour?” Matthew countered, checking his watch until it was safe for Paige to orb with her kids.

“Fine,” Cole sighed. He sounded almost annoyed that they weren’t letting him get attacked by his ex-wife.

Mel snorted. Cole always did go for danger. “Never change, Cole,” she requested.

“No, not until he changes _side_ again.”

Mel froze. She knew that voice. It haunted all of them. Wyatt.

She tore her eyes away from the failed potion to stare at her formerly loving big brother. No trace of him remained in the monster standing in the doorway.

Wyatt’s long fingers were wrapped around Tamora’s pale, delicate throat. He didn’t look angry or betrayed.

Wyatt felt nothing anymore. “I was right to distrust you,” Wyatt said, tonelessly.

“Wyatt,” Paige begged. “Please.”

Mel knew it was useless. If Wyatt hadn’t listened to her begging, to Chris’s begging, all those times that he had them chained up and tortured then he wouldn’t listen to Paige now.

“Mom?” Henry Jr. said, tearfully. Mel saw that he was tugging on Paige’s arm. “We need to go.”

Mel felt a different hand clamp down on her shoulder. She knew Henry was right.

As she and Matt shimmered away from Wyatt she saw Cole grab Kat around the middle to stop her from throwing herself at Wyatt.

Mel heard Paige shout out her daughter’s name in despair. She heard Kat’s pained scream and then she heard an unnatural snap.

All was silent.

A Charmed Child was dead.

* * *

Phoebe stood in the doorway of Piper’s bedroom, watching the scene in front of her.

Piper and Leo watching over their hurt witch lighter while their son held a one-sided conversation with Chris.

She wasn’t sure if she should interrupt. Chris was sick, and they were on a time limit, but she was reluctant to break the fragile peace between Piper and Leo. It seemed like there was something deeper going on between them. It wasn’t the love that they still shared, it was something else. A different connection.

While she was debating what to do, Piper looked away from Chris and saw her.

“Phoebe?” She said, looking worried.

Phoebe shook herself, the moment had passed. She held out the bottle of pain relief pills she had found at the back of the medicine cabinet. With Leo around they didn’t often need them.

Piper reached out to take them, but Phoebe hesitated. “We, um, Paige found the demons we think did this. We have the potions to stop them, but we’ll need to go find them.” She explained, glancing between the pair. “We can handle this on our own if you want to stay and…” Phoebe shrugged. She felt like she needed to offer Piper the option to stay even though she knew that she wouldn’t.

They would need to bring back a demon to ask them about their current boss. They needed Piper.

Piper looked surprised and torn. Phoebe could see that she wanted to help Chris but the best way for her to do that was to find out who did it.

“I can handle Chris and Wyatt on my own while you’re gone,” Leo offered.

Wyatt squealed.

Phoebe smiled. “I think Wyatt wants to help Chris too,” she interpreted. “He can keep Chris safe if anything happens.” _If Leo had to go for back up._

“Okay,” Piper decided. “Have we any idea where they are?”

“Yeah, Paige knows,” Phoebe said. “She’s still in the attic making up some spare potions.”

Piper nodded. “We’ll we’d better get this done quickly,” she said, briskly, rising to her feet and leaving.

“She’s just worried,” Phoebe said to Leo.

Leo nodded. He glanced down at Chris, who had paled significantly again. His uneven gasping breaths were only broken by moans and harsh, body wracking coughs.

“We all are.”

* * *

He was on fire.

That was Chris's first thought.

His skin burned. His blood boiled. His breaths caught on what must be smoke.

Chris began to panic.

What was going on? Had he been attacked? How had they found the safe house? Were the others alive? Had Wyatt gotten to them?

No, Chris reminded himself. He was in the past. Wyatt was only a toddler here. The others were in the present – future? – And they were counting on him.

But what had happened to him? Had a demon attacked him?

Chris remembered a searing pain in his arm, taking him by surprise. He hadn't seen the archer, only the arrow sticking out of his arm. He remembered noticing something different about the arrow. The smell? The colour? There was something that made Chris think that he should keep the arrow, but he still tore it out of his skin.

There was something on the arrow, Chris realised. Was… had he been poisoned? Was that what had happened? It made sense.

He remembered hands – familiar hands – trying to hold him up and a voice begging him to do… something. Who had been talking to him? His Dad? No, Leo. He wasn't his dad yet, he might not end up being his dad if he didn't bring his parents back together again.

Chris began to ponder how he was supposed to do that. It was difficult to try plan when his thoughts kept slipping away from him. But it was easier to plan than to focus on the burning pain throughout his body.

He had started to wonder about that when a different type of pain seared through him.

It cut through his mind and his heart. He felt like he couldn't breathe.

Chris knew what this pain was. He knew what it meant.

The image of an auburn-haired girl giggling while flames danced around her fingers came to the forefront of Chris's mind. Tamora.

The image blurred and changed to Tamora gasping and clutching her neck. Her tearful, brown eyes darted around the room to people that he couldn't see. He didn't know if he was seeing this through someone else's eyes or his own, but Chris couldn't take his eyes away from anything other than his cousin.

He felt a stab of guilt when her eyes met his, desperate. He wanted to do something. He wanted to help her. But Chris knew that she was already dead.

The cries of his family filled the room behind him, but Chris didn't check to see if he could look at them. He just stared at Tamora, wishing that she had never gone over to Wyatt's side.

The horrifying snap of her neck was somehow less heart wrenching to Chris than the slow dimming of her eyes.

Her body was dropped to the ground, falling like a rag doll. The life was gone from her body but it still chilled Chris to the core.

"Oh, poor little Tammy," taunted a familiar, heart stopping, emotionless voice. Wyatt.

Snapped back to the present, Chris felt a tingling, numbing feeling spread through his body but he didn't care. He couldn't care. Tamora was dead. Wyatt had killed her.

She was dead.

* * *

Leo always enjoyed spending time with Wyatt, but he couldn’t do that while he worried over Chris’s worsening condition. Because he could tell that Chris was getting worse.

He didn’t know what poison had been used or what the symptoms were, but Leo could tell that he was getting worse.

Occasionally, strange, unintelligible murmurs passed through his lips, but it was usually just horrible wheezes. Sometimes murmurs that sounded like names. Even through the wheezes Leo could hear the pleading, distressed tone in every unclear syllable.

Leo had wondered about Chris, mostly his intentions, ever since the young witch lighter had arrived from the future, to the past – his present. Leo tried not to spend too long thinking about that and not just because his opinion of Chris had changed.

He wondered about who Chris had been. He was very powerful for being so young, because he actually was only twenty-one. He must have been taught how to use how powers all his life. He had probably been raised by his witch and white lighter parents.

Chris knew a lot about the Charmed Ones, which had made Leo suspicious. Now, he only wondered how Chris had known them.

Chris probably wasn’t even born yet, Leo didn’t want to think about if he had been conceived yet. He must have grown up with Wyatt. As far as Leo knew, Paige and Wyatt were the only witch lighters that were born in this time.

Maybe more would be born after Leo and Piper had had a relationship. Leo tried not to think about Chris’s part in the ending of that relationship. Especially since he seemed to be what was bringing them closer together.

Leo brushed the hair away from Chris’s hot forehead. “I guess you’re still a child, and we are parents.” Leo thought for a minute. “If you were Wyatt’s friend, then did you know me and Piper?”

He must have. Leo liked to think that they would have opened their home to a young Chris Perry. He hoped that he would have been seen as one of the family. The Charmed Ones knew all about the problems of magic. Especially since Chris had mentioned not getting on with his father, Leo hoped that he could have been there for him. As a white lighter, as Wyatt’s dad.

Leo was broken out of his thoughts where he noticed Chris’s wheezing breath. Or rather, the lack of it.

He wasn’t stupid enough to hope that meant Chris had recovered.

“Chris!” He cried, holding his hands over Chris’s chest. Healing him hadn’t worked before, but he wasn’t going to do nothing while Chris died.

But Leo did find himself forced to do nothing when Chris’s body started twitching and seizing madly in a rhythm only it knew.

Wyatt started bawling crying on the other side of the room. His little face was scrunched up and red as he tried to reach out for Chris. But there was nothing either one of them could do. Leo just hoped that the girls had found the demons.

It didn’t look good for Chris, he didn’t have much time.

* * *

After the screams and explosions of the previous few minutes, the cavern was eerily silent.

The Archer demons harsh breathes, Phoebe’s quiet hisses and Paige’s hushed fussing were the only sounds.

Piper was silent, but her anger was no less terrifying. Paige never wanted to be on Piper’s bad side whenever she was that angry.

The look Paige shared with Phoebe let her know that they were both in agreement to hang back while Piper talked to the surviving demon.

‘Talked’ in the loosest sense of the word, of course.

Paige flinched as the demon screams returned. She instead focus on checking over the bad scrape on Phoebe’s arm. It was bleeding but not too badly. She only wrapped it up with a scarf to keep her hands busy.

She was glad it wasn’t any worse because she didn’t want to have to get in between Piper and the demon.

“Piper?” Phoebe called. “We need to get back soon.”

Paige applauded Phoebe’s courage while she was also terrified of how Piper might react. She had been like a maniac when they first arrived. Paige was surprised that any demons were left.

Piper growled, or that was what Paige heard. Paige hoped that she had just misheard.

Piper flicked her wrist, freezing the demon in place, instead of blowing up parts of him as she had been doing.

Phoebe snagged Paige’s hand and dragged her over to Piper’s hand. She threw Paige a look.

She was annoyed with Paige’s hesitance, she definitely understood but she was annoyed. Paige didn’t doubt that she would be scolding her that Chris was dying but she was worried about how Piper would react. They had been very careful about the ‘d-word’ concerning Chris.

They had both wondered about Piper’s surge of maternal instincts towards Chris and were scared of it too.

“Let’s hope Wyatt never brings any girls home,” Paige muttered to Phoebe before Piper grabbed a hold of her other hand and gingerly touched the demon.

As they orbed towards the house, Paige felt the usual feeling of separating and reuniting. But she also felt a strange pain inside her chest. A burning pain.

When they orbed into the attic she stumbled away from Piper and Phoebe, clutching her chest. The only time she could remember feeling like that in any way was when her parents died. Who did she know who was dying?

“Something’s happened,” she warned her sisters and then fell to the ground.


	7. Chapter 7

Mel and Matt arrived a short distance away from the Bay Mirror. They didn’t want to draw any attention to the building. It was a smart tactical move on Matt’s part. Mel imagined that she would be more impressed with him if it weren’t for the stabbing sensation in her chest.

Grief.

If she felt this bad, she didn’t want to think about how Kat was feeling.

“Oh god,” she muttered, covering her heart with her hand. “Tammy,” she moaned. Mel squeezed shut her eyes. It didn’t matter that she had turned on them once, she had tried to protect them in the end. She had tried to save Chris. Just like her mother, just like Aunt Phoebe, just like Uncle Coop, and Uncle Henry, and Grandpa. It never ended. The death.

“Mel,” Matt pulled her hand away and held it tightly in his own. “We need to move. They’re expecting us. We need to hurry if we want to save Chris.”

Matt had said the magic words that got Mel moving. She nodded. They needed to save Chris. Then he would save them. If Chris succeeded, then maybe Tam would come back.

The short walk to the newspaper was done in silence. They hurried, wary of any spies around. Mel’s thoughts were on Chris, as they always were, and on Wyatt. She wondered how he could have done such a thing to Tamora. Wyatt had always claimed that he cared about their family most of all but with him killing Bianca and Tam... The others had died when demons had attacked, Wyatt had claimed that he was not responsible for their deaths. Mel wasn’t so sure. He could have been the one to arrange their deaths.

“Don’t let him get into your head, Mel,” Matt warned. “Don’t give him that satisfaction.”

Mel exhaled heavily. “I know,” she pulled away from Matt when they reached the doors of the Bay Mirror. She led the way to their meeting room.

Kevin the Elder and Daryl Jr were sitting outside of Phoebe’s office. They watched her with sad eyes as the sounds of Kat sobbing reached them. Mel didn’t say anything in response to their quiet condolences. She had already begun to harden herself again the grief. After her mother, her aunt, her uncles and her future sister-in-law’s deaths, Tam’s death was nothing new.

* * *

 

"What have you done to my sister?" Piper asked, holding her hands ready.

The demon growled and then screamed as Piper flicked her wrists to blow him up. "Nothing!" He screamed. It had been a hurry after orbing into the attic to set up a crystal cage for the captured demon.

Piper frowned and looked back at Phoebe and Paige. After her collapse, Paige had been very drowsy and confused but she didn't have any explanation for why she collapsed. She didn't know what her feeling of something being wrong was about. Now Paige and Phoebe were watching Piper interrogate the demon with worried looks on their faces. She turned back to the demon. "What have you done to our white lighter?" She demanded.

The demon grinned. "White lighter? Do you mean that little witch lighter from the future?"

Piper let her powers answer for her.

"Fine!" He shouted. "We had orders to attack him! He gave us the poison, we don't know what it was. We don't know who he was! We just wanted to kill that little witch lighter."

Piper grit her teeth. "You don't even know what poison it was? You don't know about any cure for it?"

The demon sneered. "We always know a cure, witch. We never use poison without knowing. We know a cure – but not _the_ cure," he growled. "You will leave us alone if we tell you where it is?"

Piper considered the demon for a minute. She could tell the demon that she would leave him alone, but she didn't have to follow through. She could be being lied to. "I'll think about it."

She wouldn't get her hopes up.

* * *

Leo felt each horrible second that Chris suffered through a seizure. After thirty seconds, the erratic twitches died down and Chris was left gasping on the bed. Leo didn’t move for a long moment. Wyatt sat on the bed crying and a demon that the girls had captured screamed in the attic.

Leo took in a deep breath, trying to calm himself down. He couldn’t remember feeling this helpless when he was a medic. He had gotten too used to his healing powers over the years. Leo carefully checked Chris in the aftermath of his fit. He was still breathing, if too shallowly. He seemed to be breathing better than he had before the seizure. His heartbeat was better too, even if it was racing. Leo suddenly had a horrible thought. What if this poison was designed to prolong suffering before it killed? He wouldn’t be surprised if it did. Magic was truly evil sometimes.

He rolled Chris over onto one side to prevent him from choking and pulled the covers on the bed up around him. His fever was still high, but Leo didn’t want him falling off the bed too easily. He ignored the voice in his head that accused him of trying to make Chris as comfortable as he could. Chris wasn’t going to die, not while he was watching over him. Right now, the witch lighter was basically one of his charges and Leo did everything he could to keep his charges alive.

Leo turned to Wyatt who had crawled over to Chris and was now petting his head. It might be sweet if Wyatt wasn’t still crying and Chris wasn’t suffering. Leo sighed. He pulled Wyatt onto his lap. Wyatt protested until Leo positioned him in a way that he could still see Chris. Then he sat quietly, occasionally hiccupping, and watched Chris in way that was much too intently for his age.

Leo had worried about how close Wyatt had gotten to Chris after they had worked through their differences. He had had some wild and crazy theories about Chris trying to take his place in Wyatt’s life until he made himself reconsider if he was just jealous. Chris didn’t look at Wyatt like he was his son. Chris probably hadn’t even considered having kids, Leo reflected. Then again, he mused, he had been engaged. Maybe Chris had wanted a family.

He certainly seemed to see the girls as part of his family. Leo had watched Chris interact with Wyatt and he knew that, despite their rough start, they were quite friendly when Chris played with Wyatt. There was a level of familiarity that made Leo guess that Chris was a good friend of Wyatt in the future, before he needed to be saved by Chris.

“Who are you, Chris?” Leo muttered. “What sort of family let their son travel back to the past on some suicide mission? What family did you have?”

What sort of family do you have left? Leo didn’t say his last question aloud. Chris probably couldn’t hear him, but he didn’t want to kick the guy when he was down. Chris was alone in the present, he didn’t want to remind him of that.

“You’re not alone here,” Leo said, arguing with his thoughts. “You’ll have us.” He was certain that once Chris recovered – because he would recover – Piper would be mothering him so much that he would want new charges. Leo chuckled, he couldn’t wait to see that.

“Tam,” Chris whispered, so quiet that Leo wasn’t sure that he had said anything. “I’m so sorry,” he murmured. He sounded so heartbroken that Leo felt his own heart clench in sympathy. Whatever Chris was remembering, whoever he was remembering, things hadn’t ended well for them.

“Don’t worry buddy,” he muttered, reaching out to squeeze Chris’s shoulder. “We’ll fix this.”

* * *

 

Chris was in pain. He knew pain. He was familiar with feeling pain throughout his body. It was a common result from his strenuous demon hunting, from attacks that he didn’t dodge and from his own repeated training of his body. He wouldn’t let himself slip even when there was no threat. That was what Wyatt wanted.

“Don’t worry, buddy,” said his dad, “we’ll fix this.”

Fix what? Chris wanted to ask. Where was his dad? _When_ was his dad? Why wasn’t he helping? What was happening?

Tamora was dead. She was another family member that he had failed to save. Chris added her to his mental list of failures. His failure to save Wyatt meant that another innocent had died, even if Tammy wasn’t so innocent. She was still his little cousin, it was his duty to protect her. And he had failed. All he ever did was mess up. That was what his dad had always said. He was always in the way. That was why he needed to fix something now, because Chris had messed up.

“You didn’t mess up, Chris. I’m the one who messed up. I should have listened to you and Melinda. I should have listened to you about Wyatt. I should not have left you alone with Wyatt. I’m sorry.”

“Dad?” Chris was confused. That wasn’t his father. His father never apologised to him. This wasn’t Leo either. Who was talking to him? He felt like he was surrounded by light. It reminded him of ‘up there’. But it had been destroyed. What was happening? How was his dad talking to him? Why did he not hurt anymore?

“Yes, Chris. You’re very sick right now. But you need to hang on. Your sister would be very upset if you left before she got to see you again.”

“Mel?” Mel was coming? How? She was in the future – or, present. Chris was too sick to figure that out.

“Yes, she’s coming, buddy. You need to wait for her. For me, alright? I’m sorry I wasn’t around. And I’m sorry that I can’t tell you this in person, but I love you. You need to hold on for me. For everyone. We need you – not just to save Wyatt.”

“Dad!” Chris called out as the light faded. He was left alone in the darkness. Something was wrong, he knew it. He wasn’t awake, but he wasn’t asleep. He was in some strange sort of limbo. Was he sick?

Poison.

That was it! He had been poisoned!

That wasn’t good.

Chris got the feeling that he had come to this conclusion before. He wasn’t thinking all that clearly at the moment. It was disconcerting. He was used to his quick thinking. His sharp mind had saved his life on numerous occasions. He didn’t want to lose that.

Chris felt his limited awareness fade with a surge of panic. Something was very wrong with him. And there was something else.

Oh god, Mel was coming to the past!

* * *

 

Phoebe watched Piper torture the demon with one eye as she stirred her tea. She had gotten some for Paige after her collapse, but she was needed to have something in her hands to occupy her attention while Piper, her big sister, was this angry. She was in full mama bear mode and it was freaking out Phoebe.

Whenever Prue had been mad, it had only been a cold sort of anger. Paige’s anger was quick and sharp, but Piper’s was out of control. Even with the empathy blocking potion, Phoebe could feel Piper’s rage and it scared her. At the same time, she began to understand Piper’s anger even more.

Piper was angry because of Chris, she was angry for Chris. All this was to protect him. Chris had done everything he had done to protect Wyatt, in his own strange way. He had done questionable things for people he cared about. Piper was the exact same.

No wonder Piper was so protective of Chris all of a sudden. She saw herself in Chris. They both cared deeply about their families, whoever Chris’s family was. Phoebe hoped that they knew how much Chris loved them.

Her thoughts were cut off by a strange feeling in her heart. It was a pulsing, pulling sensation. She gasped.

“Phoebe?” Paige worried.

Phoebe looked to her little sister. It felt like she had formed a psychic link with someone. It felt familiar, but she was sure that she had never felt this connection before. It was incredibly strong. And it was getting stronger.

It was coming.

* * *

 

Cole had been the King of the Underworld. He commanded demons who surely could have fought against him with only himself. That took an awful lot of charisma, of presence, of power.

He was using every inch of that now as he silenced the room simply by rising to his feet.

Everyone turned to him, awaiting his orders on what to do next. This was his plan. He was in charge. Mel didn’t envy him. She had always been in awe of Chris, of Piper, of Wyatt – even now – with their power to order others and to have them follow.

“We don’t have a lot of time,” he began. “So, let’s get this done quickly, who is coming to the past with me? Someone needs to stay and protect the safe havens. Paige – your healing powers are needed, yours too Leo. Parker – Pearl and Peyton are too young, you need to stay and protect them. That leaves Mel, PJ and Kat free to come. Are you alright with that?” He asked.

“I’m coming,” Mel agreed. She wasn’t going to let anyone change that. She was going to see Chris again. “And so is Matt.”

Matt nodded. “They’ve met me in the past. They’ll recognise me. And, having another half-demon would only help you Cole. It will draw fire,” he argued.

“I’m going as well,” Henry said. He held Kat in his arms, still shaking. Yet, his gaze was hard. Henry, being the only mortal in the Charmed family had been forced into more danger than anyone else but he had never let it change him. Seeing his sister murdered in front of him by his oldest cousin had finally done that. Henry wasn’t going to take no for an answer any more than Mel would. He wasn’t going to let Kat slip away from him before he could do anything about it. Mel wouldn’t stop him.

Cole wouldn’t either. “Fine,” he muttered.

“Three Charmed Ones, two half-demons and a mortal,” PJ observed, she twirled her bow in her hands. “The past won’t know what hit it.”

Mel happened to glance over at her father in the same moment that he opened his mouth to speak. Their eyes met for a moment. Nothing was said between them, but Mel felt as though they had communicated something important between them both. Leo pulled Parker, Peyton and Pearl over to him as Paige stood up, releasing her children from her arms.

They were all that was left of the last generation of Charmed Ones. They had watched their loved ones die. They didn’t want to lose any more children.

“Stay safe,” Leo had silently begged. “Come back home to me.”

“I will,” Mel had promised. “We’ll fix all of this.”

It was what they had all told Chris before he travelled back. Leo, Bianca, her and Matt had all said their goodbyes to him last. Leo had nearly been too late to say goodbye, but his words hadn’t lost any meaning when he had told his son to keep safe. Bianca had begged Chris to come home. Matt had asked him to fix their past, to undo the mistakes that had been done.

Mel had only hugged him goodbye. When she saw him next, she would tell him she loved him.

She was coming.


	8. Chapter 8

Mel watched PJ kiss Parker, Peyton and Pearl goodbye, whispering something to each before she pulled away. Despite herself, Mel felt a stab of envy at the heartbroken expression on the cupids' faces. She didn't have many more people to lose, or many people to say to goodbye to. Her cousins, her aunt, her friends – they were all ready for her to turn up dead. Even Leo.

 

Paige was clutching Kat and Henry Jr to her, like she never wanted to let them go. Mel remembered how tightly she, Chris and Wyatt had clung to each other after her mother's death. It was last time she had seen Wyatt as her brother. Before he became evil. At first, Mel hadn't blamed him. They were young and angry and grieving. They wanted all the fighting to stop but Wyatt went too far. People died. He hadn't cared who. Mel wondered sometimes if Chris was trying to save Wyatt or trying to undo all the death that they had caused by not stopped their brother earlier.

 

"Mel," Leo said, hesitantly.

 

Mel looked away from her cousins when Leo pulled her off to one side. They had never been much for long goodbyes. They had rarely given each other much more than a 'by the way' before they undertook dangerous or nearly suicidal missions. That was why she was surprised by the red rimming his eyes. But, she supposed, if they failed in this then Leo will have lost all his children.

 

"Is it about Chris?" She asked, worried.

 

Leo nodded. "I can feel him," he explained. "The portal to the past hasn't closed fully, it can't until Chris is back. I can still sense him.

 

_As his father or as his white lighter?_ Mel wondered but she didn't say it. It was no use trying to start a fight about Leo's parenting skills right now. "Is he doing alright?" She asked, hopefully instead. Too many of her friends had wasted away after escaping Wyatt only to get poisoned in the process.

 

"I've asked him to hold on," Leo replied, looking helpless. "Begged him, really. But I don't know." He sighed. "I told him you were coming, I don't know if he heard."

 

"He'll hold on," Mel said with confidence that she didn't feel.

 

"Yeah," Leo muttered, sounding half as confident as Mel felt. Which was to say, not at all.

 

"But if he doesn't?" Mel asked, unable to stop the desperate question. She felt like a little girl again, asking her daddy to make everything better. Except Mel had never had to ask Leo to make things better. She had always had Chris or Wyatt or her mother to help her. Mel wasn't sure how to make it in a world where her mother was dead, her brother was evil, and Chris was… she didn't even want to think it.

 

"Chris has always surpassed every expectation I've have of him," Leo admitted. "Even if they were pitifully low. He won't give up, even if it's just to prove everyone wrong."

 

Mel smiled weakly at her dad. Matt came up beside her, he quietly squeezed her hand at the same time as he squeezed Leo's shoulder.

 

"Chris has never let us down before, we shouldn't start doubting him just yet. He might need our help now, but I'm sure he's got everything else under control," Matt assured them both.

 

Leo smiled at Matt. "Thank you. Make sure that you take care of yourself in the future, I know _you're_ in no danger of erasing your existence, but your future is still in danger," he reminded him. " _Both_ of you need to remember to keep your future's safe." Leo took a deep breath and let it out shakily. "I would rather not lose either of you, even if it meant that Chris…" Leo didn't finish.

 

Mel, even as she internally screamed, nodded. She understood, in a way. She would prefer to have Chris alive than to have him die in the past trying to save Wyatt. Even if that meant that they would have to kill Wyatt in the present. No one wanted to lose anyone else trying to save a man who didn't want to be saved.

 

Mel could admit, to herself, that she only wanted to save Wyatt because it meant that Bianca, her mother and Tamora would be alive. She couldn't bring herself to care about her brother. She couldn't let herself care about Wyatt, not after everything he did. She imagined that Chris would be horrified if he ever found that out. Then again, Wyatt had never killed his own family before. Maybe Chris would see the irredeemable monster that the world knew Wyatt to be.

 

"Is everyone ready?" Cole asked.

 

Mel looked to her cousins, checking them over. They stood tall and proud. And scared too. That summed up pretty much every Resistance member out there; strong and steely, while shaking in fear. The Charmed Children stepped away from their family members and towards Cole.

 

Their plan involved Cole and Matt shimmering them as close to the Manor as they dared. The security would no doubt be even higher than usual after Tamora's death. No doubt Wyatt would expect repercussions. Once they arrived, it would be a matter of stealth to sneak into the Manor. That was one benefit of having the home base of the world's biggest evil be your childhood home, you knew all the secrets. Mel pushed away the memory of Aunt Phoebe telling her about sneaking in through the second-storey windows after curfew. She needed to focus on the present, then she could deal with the past.

 

"Remember to be careful about using your powers," Paige warned, standing next to Leo. "There are only a few witch-lighters in the past." She shot Mel a particularly hard look, warning her, specifically, not to mess up by using her powers. Mel wanted to be indignant, but she had to admit that she had forgotten that she would have to hide her white lighter powers. At least at first.

 

PJ reached out and squeezed her hand. Mel squeezed back, gratefully. "I wonder has anyone ever heard of a witch-cupid hybrid around that time? Or were the Halliwells revolutionaries in creating hybrid families?" PJ teased.

 

Despite herself, Mel smiled, even though it soon fell as she thought of all the other hybrid children that she had known growing up. Most of them were dead or had defected to Wyatt. Hybrids were slightly more powerful, and much more valuable or dangerous to a dark regime. There weren't many of them left on either side anymore.

 

"If worse comes to worst, you'll keep going, won't you?" Henry Jr asked suddenly.

 

Mel started. She hadn't thought of that. She stared at Leo and Paige carefully, with their remaining cousins crowded around their aunt and uncle. She imagined that they would keep protecting the children, and healing the injured members of the resistance, but she doubted that their hearts would be in it. She had never lost a child – even if she had lost every other family member – but she imagined it would be impossible to go on. All that was keeping Paige going right now was the hope that they would succeed and Tamora's death would be undone. Although, her life could be undone too.

 

They were really playing with fire here, weren't they? Would they even know who got burned? Would they wake up in a safe world one day, remembering when everything was destroyed, when they lived in fear? Or would they go on with their new, daily life, not knowing that their neighbours had ratted them out or that members of their family don't exist anymore? She decided that she didn't want to think about it. All she wanted to do was save Chris. She would deal with whatever else came at her when it came.

 

"We'll do our best," Leo promised, stiffly.

 

_Liar,_ Mel thought, but she didn't say anything. No one did. They all just stared at each other before, on some unspoken signal, Matt and Cole took two Charmed Children each and shimmered away to their possible death.

 

Mel's last glimpse of her father was of him turning his head away so that she wouldn't see him break down.

* * *

Phoebe pressed a hand to her chest, just over her heart. She was aware of Paige watching her, worriedly. "I'm okay," she murmured. "It's just…" she didn't really have the words to describe it, but Paige nodded anyway.

 

"We're all a little shook up with everything that's happening to Chris," she offered as an excuse.

 

Phoebe pounced on it gratefully. "Yeah, that must be it." She passed Paige her mug of tea. "I think I'll go check on him. Make sure that he and Leo haven't killed each other," she joked.

Paige's lips twitched in a tiny smile. "Yeah," she muttered. She glanced over at Piper, who hadn't noticed Phoebe's gasp and was still interrogating the demon. She frowned. "Is this…? Should we…? Should I stop her?" She asked, uncertainly, her eyes flicking over to Phoebe.

 

Phoebe looked to her older sister with her own frown. "I don't know," she admitted. "I don't think getting in between Piper and her goal of saving Chris is in any way safe right now but… I don't like what this is turning her into. I haven't seen her like this since Prue," she added.

 

Paige hummed. "It reminds me Chris, actually. Of how he was after Bianca died."

 

Phoebe blinked at the comparison. Now that Paige mentioned it, their reactions to grief were very similar. Chris and Piper really did have a lot in common. A thought poked at the back of Phoebe's mind. She refused to let it come to the forefront, though. It didn't make any sense – _but it did_ , her empathy powers whispered – and she didn't have any proof.

 

When Chris recovered, because Piper would make sure of that, Phoebe would just have to sit on him until she got a straight answer. Or maybe she could offer to save him from Piper's aggressive mothering once he began to heal. Phoebe pushed away that thought. _Aggressive smothering,_ she corrected.

 

"I'm going to go check on Chris," she announced to Piper. Piper only spared a glance over her shoulder. To Paige, she muttered, "make sure she doesn't go overboard?"

 

Paige nodded. "Tell Chris we're rooting for him."

 

Phoebe strode out of the attic and didn't look back. That feeling in her chest had grown the longer she stayed in the attic, but Phoebe had a feeling that she would be better off sitting with Chris. She still couldn't help herself from hoping that Chris would have miraculously recovered in the time that they had been away. But one glance at Leo's pinched face chased away that hope.

 

Leo stared at Chris with such open despair and worry that it was hard to believe that him and Chris hadn't always gotten along. He looked as though he was about to lose a brother.

 

_Or a son_ , Phoebe's treacherous thought whispered. She ignored it again. She still had no proof. "Any change?" She asked Leo.

 

He shook his head. "He started talking a while ago," Leo was interrupted by Chris's heartbroken murmur of "Tam," before he continued, "he had a seizure too."

 

"Poor Chris," Phoebe sighed. She moved to the head of the bed to pet the witch-lighter's hair. Wyatt paused in the middle of the same task to look up at her and hiccup. She forced a smile onto her face. "It'll be okay, Wyatt," she lied. "Chris'll be fine. Your mommy will make sure of that," she promised.

 

Wyatt huffed and resumed patting Chris's sweat-soaked hair.

 

"Mel," Chris muttered. His voice was much clearer.

 

Phoebe sucked in a breath when Chris's eyes cracked open. "Chris?" She called, hopefully.

"Mel," he repeated, louder and more insistently.

 

"Who's Mel, Chris?" Leo asked, moving closer, trying to encourage Chris to interact with the world and not get lost in delusions.

 

"Th... they're coming."

* * *

 

Mel kept close to the wall of the Manor, PJ behind her, Kat behind her and Matt bring up the rear. She followed closely behind Henry Jr while Cole scouted ahead. She watched him peer around the corner.

 

"We're clear," he whispered, gesturing them forward.

 

Henry moved quick enough that Mel had to hurry to keep up. Getting to the Manor from their arrival point had been a challenge. In ideal circumstances, it would have only been a two-minute walk but as things were now, it had taken them nearly half an hour of creeping forward inch by inch. Now, things were moving much quicker.

 

Mel's heart began to pound with fear and anticipation. They were going to break into the home of their evil overlord, it was thrilling. Even ignoring the time travel, this was a heart pounding situation, especially considering that this plan had only been made in the last few hours.

 

Henry took over as leader once they rounded the corner to the front of the Manor. If there was one weakness of the Manor, it was its front door. Wyatt never updated or improved the security to the front of the house. Mel didn't know if that was Wyatt's arrogance or the house's own magic. The ancestral home of such a powerful line of witches was bound to have its own secrets after all.

 

Their plan was to sneak in the front door of the Manor, and then orb to the attic. PJ held the spell to travel to the past hidden in her quiver. The three Charmed girls would recite the spell, and, with any luck, they would be gone before anyone had the chance to stop them. The orb alarms in the house would go off as soon as they moved in but there was nothing they could do about that. Nothing but hope that they were fast enough, of course.

 

Henry reached the door and crouched low. Mel followed his lead. From right behind her, Cole brushed his fingers against her shoulder. She wasn't sure if she imagined his mutter of "good luck." If she, or any magical being, opened the door the sensors would detect her magic immediately and alert the house. But Henry didn't have any magic. He could open the door and then she would orb him up as soon as they cleared the threshold.

 

Henry glanced back at her. "Ready?" he mouthed.

 

She nodded. _Let's do this,_ she thought.

 

From the moment Henry's hand grasped the handle, Mel suddenly knew something was wrong. She just couldn't put her finger on what. But, really, it didn't matter what went wrong, only that something did.

 

It only mattered that, when the door to the Halliwell house opened, Ryake was waiting.


	9. Chapter 9

Mel froze. In front of her, Henry, too, had gone deathly still. Even Ryake appeared surprised to see them.

 

The Demon recovered quicker than they did. With an evil grin, he flung out his hand, knocking Henry back away from the door. Henry fell with a shout, all the air audibly rushing from his lungs. Mel flinched at the sound his skull made when it slammed back against ground.

 

She gritted her teeth together and rose to her feet. Before she could raise her own hands to blast him, Ryake was ready to attack again.

 

PJ had readied herself quicker than Mel or Henry and had fired an arrow at Ryake. The Demon waved his hand, almost lazily, and knocked the arrow back towards PJ.

 

“Arrow!” Kat hissed while Matt dragged PJ out of its path.

 

Before it hit the ground, PJ had pulled out of Matt’s grip and snatched it up. “Kat, check Henry!” She ordered as she prepared to knock the retrieved arrow.

 

Ryake was too busy watching PJ to focus on Cole. That proved to be a big mistake when Cole threw a fireball at Wyatt’s lieutenant with a shout of rage.

 

He stumbled back with a growl, and, while he was off balance, Mel tackled him. Before he could react, Mel leaned back blew up his face.

 

Ryake’s screech of pain caused Mel to rear back and cover her ears. She cursed. Loudly. Not that it could be heard over Ryake’s scream.

 

“Hurry!” Cole shouted from somewhere behind her.

 

Mel was only able to glance over her shoulder before Matt had grabbed her arm and dragged her away from the crying, newly faceless demon. She was barely out of his reach before Matt shimmered them both away to the attic.

* * *

 

PJ dropped Kat's hand as soon as they orbed into the attic. Their fight with Ryake had been unplanned but it had still been salvageable, until Mel blew up his face and his screaming alerted every guard in the Manor. Although, PJ wasn't too angry at Mel for that. Ryake had been behind her father's death. Getting his face blown off was barely on the list of things that she wanted to happen to that monster. And it was a long list.

 

Without PJ taking up her second hand, Kat focused all her attention on Henry. He hadn't lost consciousness, but he hadn't opened his eyes. They were squeezed shut in pain.

 

"It'll be okay, Henry," she soothed, worriedly.

 

PJ kept half an eye on Kat while she turned to Mel and Matt. They were still holding each other, with Matt trying to scoop Ryake's blood out of her hair. Cole had pulled out a piece of chalk and was busy drawing the triquetra circle. As soon as he finished, PJ, Mel and Kat would have to read the spell. They would need the Power of Three to get the six of them to a specific point in the past.

 

Alarms blared throughout the Manor, masking the sound of Mel slamming shut the attic door with a wave of her hand. She pulled away from Matt and brushed her doubtlessly sticky hair away from her face. Matt moved over to Henry and helped pull him to his feet.

 

"I hope you still have the spell, PJ," Cole muttered, beckoning them over to the wall.

 

PJ slipped off her quiver and pulled out the tiny sheet of folded paper. Chris had written a spell before in case he failed and one of them needed to go to the past to finish what he started. Paige had rewritten the spell before they left.

 

Behind their backs, there was a banging at the door. The demons had finally figured out where they had gone.

 

"We can't waste any time," Cole reminded them. "Matt, take Henry through first, then the girls. I'll cover you, just in case."

 

"Don't forget to follow us, Cole," PJ warned. Her voice had an edge that made her sound shockingly like her mother had when she had dealt with Cole. She knew that the half-demon wouldn't dare disobey her when she used that tone.

 

"Go on," Matt urged.

 

Wordlessly, Kat snatched up PJ's hand and Mel snaked an arm around PJ's other arm. With their heads in close together they spoke as one,

 

_"Hear our words, hear our rhyme,_

_Send us to another time,_

_Know our hope, know our plea,_

_To find our displaced family."_

 

PJ hardly dared to glance up from the paper but once she did, she saw the swirling blue vortex that she hoped would lead them to the past. To Chris. To her mother, as well.

 

_She's not your mother yet,_ PJ reminded herself. But it was hard to remember seeing as the bond she had always shared with her mother, as one empath to another, as mother and daughter, was back. PJ had felt it shattered with her mother's death. She had felt it as it withered after her dad was murdered. But that hadn't hurt as keenly as it did now.

 

Knowing that her mother was so close, and she couldn't reach out to her and tell her how much so loved her, how much she missed her. She wasn't even in the past yet. How did Chris do it, she wondered. Especially considering that he had held Piper in his arms when she died.

 

"Matt, Henry, go!" Mel ordered.

 

Matt didn't need to be told twice. With Henry's arms over his shoulder, he dragged him through the portal. Matt didn't hesitate to go through, despite the ice-cold fear that PJ could sense.

 

The boys had barely cleared the portal when the attic door splintered.

 

"Go! I'll hold them off!" Cole shouted.

 

PJ unwrapped Mel's arm from around her own and shoved the other girl forward. Mel stumbled through, gracelessly with a glance over her shoulder at Cole. Kat moved forward with minimal prodding from PJ. She sensed that the younger girl was desperate to see that her brother was okay.

 

Now it was only PJ, Cole and the horde of demons swarming the attic.

 

"PJ!" Cole hissed, spotting her still standing beside the portal.

 

PJ ignored him. She pulled out her bow and knocked an arrow. She had to make sure that no demons got through the portal until it closed. She would leave Cole if she had to. Or so she told herself.

 

"Prudence Johana! Get through that portal!" Cole shouted when an arrow whizzed past his ear into the throat of a purple haired demon that had moved to hit him in the back. It was Jarik, the leader of the Archer demons, Cole noticed. At least they had accomplished that much.

 

"I'm not letting you kill yourself here, Cole!" PJ shouted back. "If you want to die, at least let yourself see Mom first!" She fired another arrow into the eye socket of a demon that had gotten too close to the portal.

 

Cole let out an enraged shout. "Fine!" He spat. "But get in there first!"

 

"Deal!" PJ laughed. She still couldn't resist the urge to fire one more arrow into a purple, horned demon. With a quick glance to ensure that Cole was now moving towards the portal, PJ jumped through into the swirling vortex of magic.

 

The dizzying twists and turns seemed to last an eternity, and yet, it was all too soon before she was tumbling back out into the attic, into the pile of her awaiting cousins and under the scrutiny of her long-dead aunt.


	10. Chapter 10

"What is this cure?" Piper questioned, glaring into the Archer demon's beady eyes.

 

He sneered back at her. "Why do you want to know so much, _witch_ ? White lighters are a dime-a-dozen. Or," he bared his teeth. "Is it that you do have a _type_?"

 

Piper stared down the demon. She waited a moment for him to regret that remark before she flicked her wrists. He screamed again.

 

When she had first started torturing this demon, the screams had bothered her, but then he had decided to be difficult, and she started to feel less bad about what she was doing.

 

"Uh, Piper!" Paige called, suddenly.

 

Piper glanced over her shoulder at her youngest sister, but Paige wasn't looking at her. She was looking at the wall, where a large triquetra had appeared.

 

Piper cursed. "Where's Phoebe?"

 

"Downstairs," Paige answered. "She's with Chris."

 

Piper gritted her teeth around another curse. She rounded the demon's cage to stand closer to the portal. Her hands were raised, ready to blow up whoever came close.

 

She hesitated, however, when a young man stumbled through, supporting a second, younger man.

 

"Don't attack! Please!" The first man called, looking startled to see them. His hands were occupied with keeping the younger man standing but he looked very much like he would be holding them above his head otherwise. "We mean you no harm!"

 

"We mean you no harm?" Paige repeated, dubiously. "You just showed up here!"

 

"Paige, potions," Piper ordered. She could hear Paige orbing them to her. "Who are you people?"

 

"We're –" The man was cut off by a young woman stepping out of the portal.

 

The woman stumbled a step before catching herself. Then she caught sight of Piper and nearly stumbled again. But she caught herself again and deliberately pulled her eyes away. Piper couldn't shake the feeling that she had seen the woman before, but it was hard to tell with the green, demon blood on her clothes and in her hair.

 

A second woman followed the demon blood covered girl. She stepped out of the portal without any difficulty, but she barely acknowledged anyone else in the room before she was taking the younger man in her arms, protectively. The first man, now free of the second, briefly brushed his hand against the first woman's. Then they both turned to stare at the portal, ignoring the sisters.

 

"Who are you?" Paige demanded once it became clear that they weren't going to answer Piper.

 

There was a long moment when the foursome didn't acknowledge Paige or Piper, instead they moved closer to the portal. They seemed to get more agitated, which worried Piper. They didn't look like demons, but they didn't seem like innocents.

 

Then, a third girl, with a bow clutched in her hand fell out of the portal, barrelling into the others and knocking them all to the floor.

 

The portal began to close behind them, until a final man stepped through. His presence made Piper ready to blow up the six strangers, almost only on principal.

 

"Cole," she snapped.

 

The former Source spared a glance at the young men and women sprawled on the floor before raising his hands in a sign of surrender.

 

"Piper, please," he began.

 

Piper flicked her wrists, making the chair behind Cole explode. "You're supposed to be dead."

 

"I am," Cole answered. "Sort of. It's complicated, but not important."

 

"What do mean not important?" Paige asked, arm held back to throw a potion.

 

"We're from the future," the girl with the bow piped up from the floor.

 

"We're here to help, Chris," added the girl covered in demon gunk. She pushed out of the pile and rose to her feet. "He was injured by a demon. He is here, right?"

 

Piper tensed. The girl sounded genuinely concerned about their witch lighter which reassured and worried Piper all at once.

 

Chris did have people who cared for him, but what could be so wrong with him that it took six people to travel to the past to save him?

 

"We're not telling you that," Paige snapped.

 

The youngest of the woman, the one with red hair glanced up from the man in her arms. She stared at Paige for a moment.

"He's here," she said decisively, sounding entirely sure of herself.

 

The gunk-girl curled up her fists. She looked at Piper, and her face twisted. "Please, he's our family."

 

"Is he _Cole's_ family?" Paige questioned, with a dark look at the man in question.

 

The girl with the bow moved protectively in front of Cole in response to Paige's glare.

 

"Chris is not related to me," Cole assured. "I knew his parents, and I work with him in the resistance, and the rest of his family too, of course."

 

"Chris could've mentioned that," Paige muttered, her face screwing up in irritation.

 

"I'm dead, as far as you knew," Cole reminded her. "There was no point, besides, he knows how much you like me, Paige," he said, sarcastically.

 

"Is that how he knew so much about us?" Piper demanded, before Paige could launch herself at the half demon. "You told him?"

 

Cole shook his head, struggling for a moment. "I didn't tell Chris anything. I can't say anything else though, future consequences and everything."

 

Piper's lips twitched at hearing their witch lighters favourite saying coming out of their enemy's mouth.

 

"Why are you here?" Paige asked. She took a threatening step forward.

 

The youngest man pushed away from the red-haired girl and stumbled to his feet. "We can't waste time here. Chris is in danger. We can't let you kill Cole, I'm sorry but he is family. If you won't let us past to help Chris, then I'm sure Mel is more than happy to go through anything in her way."

 

The gunk girl twitched and nodded. "Even the Charmed Ones." Her voice was strained, like she didn't want to do it, but she readied herself to fight anyway. Piper didn't doubt that the girl would fight if it came to it.

 

"But we'd all rather it not come to that," the man continued, with a glance at Mel. "It would ruin our timeline and erase all our existences, for one. So, please, Paige, you can save Chris, or you can kill Cole. We all already know what choice you're going to make."

 

Piper watched out of the corner of her eye as Paige twitched before lowering the potions.

 

"You try anything with Phoebe – if you get within ten feet of her – I will kill you," she threatened.

 

"That's fair," Cole agreed, lowering his hands. He moved closer to the youngest man, slipping a hand under his elbow. "If you wouldn't mind calling Leo?" He asked. "Henry is injured."

 

Henry proved that point by pressing both hands to his head. Paige didn't say anything but, after sharing a look with Piper, she did orb downstairs, hopefully to get Leo.

 

Piper turned her attention to Mel. She still felt as though the girl was familiar. Mel was watching the demon she had trapped. Her eyes narrowed. "Where'd you find him?" She asked Piper, suspiciously.

 

Piper bristled, considering that Mel had threatened her only a minute ago. "He's an Archer demon."

 

"I know," Mel answered, as though it was obvious. Maybe it was, Chris seemed to know the Book of Shadows back to front. Maybe Mel knew it too.

 

"He attacked Chris," Piper explained.

 

"What?" Mel asked, shocked. Piper stared. "But," she paused before she swore loudly. "He's Lokl," she hissed, as though that name meant anything to Piper. "He's from the future. He's one of the Archer demons' lieutenants, but he shouldn't be here yet! He's still in trapped in a tomb in Egypt!"

 

Piper turned to stare at the grinning Archer demon. Maybe he had gotten out early?

 

"Good job, sweetheart," the demon cooed, blowing Piper's theory out of the water. "You're almost as smart as your brother. Though, _he_ didn't recognise me when I shot him."

 

"Oh, I'll kill you," Mel promised, stepping closer to the demon's cage. Piper had to pull her back from trying to walk right in and pummel him. She certainly saw the similarities between the angry woman and her neurotic witch lighter. Chris never backed down from a fight either.

 

"Then you'll never find out where the cure is," the demon, Lokl, threatened.

 

This time, Mel smirked. "Your cure won't work. I know where the _real_ cure is. I'm from the future too, remember? And I got a much better education than you did from your idiot overlord, Lokl," she hissed. "He's left you here to die, you know that, don't you?"

 

The demon had stopped smiling but his confidence wasn't diminished. "Jarik won't leave me in the past."

 

The woman with the bow stepped forward, towards the purple, horned demon. "Sorry to tell you this, but I shot Jarik in the chest," she held up her bow for emphasis. "He's not coming for you," she added. "And Ryake is a little... busy. Your Overlord won't come for you either. I doubt he even knows your name, _demon_."

 

"You only saw Jarik?" Mel asked, suddenly fearful.

 

Piper watched the exchange between the two girls with a growing sense of unease.

 

The woman nodded.

 

"So," Mel wondered aloud, "If Jarik is running this, and _he_ was hiding out in the future, then where's his brother?"

 

Piper didn't know if anyone had an answer to that question, or why it was significant, because suddenly, Cole was shouting out a warning and Mel was shoving her out of the way.

 

Piper stared up at the group of Archer demons that had suddenly shimmered into the attic, led by a seething, purple haired demon.


	11. Chapter 11

"Leo," Paige called, orbing into the room.

 

Leo and Phoebe both jumped. They had both been occupied trying to hear Chris's near silent mumbling. They hadn't expected to be interrupted.

 

"Paige? What's wrong?" Leo asked.

 

He didn't miss the sideways look that Paige shot Phoebe before she said, "there's a situation in the attic. Some people say that they're here from the future. They're Chris' family. One of them needs healing, apparently."

 

Leo was stunned. Chris's family had arrived from the future. He hadn't imagined that.

 

"What do they look like?" Phoebe asked. "Who are they?"

 

Paige gave Phoebe a worried look while Leo frowned. What did what they looked like have to do with anything?

 

"Leo," Paige pressed. "Healing? We'll stay here with Chris," she added, hastily. She grabbed Phoebe's arm as she said so.

 

"Okay," Leo nodded. He had a feeling that he was missing something, but Phoebe seemed equally in the dark about whatever was going on, so he didn't feel quite so stupid. He looked down at Chris worriedly.

 

"Leo," Paige insisted. "Piper's alone up there," she reminded him somewhat forcefully.

 

Leo only nodded, confused, before he orbed upstairs.

 

"Piper?" He asked, "Paige said…" Leo didn't finish because, at that moment the caged Archer demon was hit in the chest with an arrow. He gave a pained screech as he burned to ash.

 

Leo spun around to see a horde of demons in the attic. Archer demons, just like the demon in the cage. But why had they killed him then? Leo wondered, but he didn't give much more thought to that. He didn't have time because he needed to focus on the demon attack.

 

One of the demons headed for Piper, and a young woman standing beside her. The woman, Leo noticed, looked vaguely familiar. Piper and the young woman moved to stand back to back, defending each other on both sides. They both had their hands raised, ready to attack.

 

They could have been sisters. He didn't think much more about that either though, instead he shot lightning at the approaching demon.

 

There were two more women in the attic. The red-haired girl was orbing arrows out of the air and handing them to the second woman, clutching a bow. The bow wielding woman fired rapidly at every demon in sight.

 

A young man was crouched down in a corner, holding his head. Leo assumed that he was the one who Paige had called him to heal. A second man was standing in front of him, blocking him from any demon attacks while fending off the horde of demons with a dagger.

 

He was holding up quite well, rapidly attacking and dodging while defended his companion.

 

A third man was stood in the middle of the fray, shooting fireballs at an alarming rate. Leo nearly froze in shock when he realised that he did know this man. What was Cole doing here?

 

A demon just behind Leo was suddenly thrown. Leo only noticed him by his cry when he was thrown across the room.

 

"Pay attention Leo!" The woman with Piper snapped.

 

Leo took the woman's words to heart, despite also wondering how this stranger knew his name. He wanted a lot of answers once this fight was finished.

 

Who was the red-haired girl with orbing powers? He didn't recognise her as a white lighter. Paige had said that they were from the future, so was she a future white lighter? And woman with the bow, that wasn't a conventional bow. It was a cupid's bow. Where had she gotten it? And what the hell was Cole doing here? How had the familiar looking woman known Leo's name?

 

Leo decided that those were questions for later. He shot lightning at the demons surrounding the two young men, seeing as everyone else seemed to be handling themselves quite well. He only needed to shock a handful of demons that were attacking the four women in the room. They held their own against the horde.

 

He expected as much from Piper, especially with Wyatt downstairs but it gave him another question to add to his list. Who were these people that they were fighting as well as a Charmed One?

* * *

 

"Chris."

 

Chris's head felt heavy. His mind was fuzzy. He couldn't get his thoughts together. He thought he could remember waking up like this before, but the memory slipped away from him before he could examine it. Something… something had happened, he knew.

 

"Chris, wake up."

 

Chris knew that voice, but he knew it couldn't be real. He wasn't… He was sick, wasn't he?

Chris had come to that conclusion the last time he woke up. His dad had been there. Or had he? He had heard Leo's voice, but his dad had still been in the future. The Leo who wasn't his father yet had been speaking to him, but that wasn't the same Leo he had heard talking. Had his dad contacted him from the future? Was that possible?

 

A stab of pain laced through his aching brain. He groaned.

 

What was wrong with him? He was too hot. He was too… Where was he? Who was calling him? What happened? Something had happened. Something bad. Something important.

Mel was coming but, why was she coming?

 

"Yes, Chris. I know you know," the voice encouraged.

 

"Tamora," Chris whimpered. His cousin. His little cousin had died. She had been murdered at his brother's hand.

 

Wyatt.

 

Chris's eyes shot open. "Wyatt," he muttered staring at the man before him.

 

It didn't matter though. This wasn't real. Wyatt wasn't really here. Yet, Chris could still see him standing in front of him.

 

His long blonde hair was unbrushed. His eyes were wild, and his grin stretched across his face. Blood splatters covered his face and neck, but the blood didn't show up against the blackness of his clothes. Much like the blackness of his soul, Chris mused.

 

"Oh, Chris. Ouch. I'm hurt," the hallucinate of Wyatt said, feigning hurt.

 

"You killed her," Chris replied.

 

"Are you referring to little Tammy? Or to your pretty Bianca?"

 

If this Wyatt weren't a hallucination, Chris would have strangled him where he stood. Even with his body shaking with exhaustion.

 

"You killed our family," Chris hissed.

 

Wyatt snarled. "Actually, Christopher, that was you. Who was it that couldn't save Mom?" The vision started to move, circling Chris like he was a lion and Chris was a downed gazelle, waiting to be killed. "Didn't you love her, Chrissy?" Wyatt asked rhetorically.

 

"Did you want your Mommy to die? What is so wrong with you that you can't heal? Which one of us is really the monster, Chris? You say I'm evil, but I was able to love enough to heal." The hallucination hummed. "Would you be able to save little Mellie if I hurt her, I wonder? I'll have to test that."

 

"Don't you touch her," Chris growled, shaking in rage now. "Don't touch any of them."

 

"Oh, _Chris,_ " Wyatt sighed, pitifully. "Don't you know?" He grinned revealing rows of sharp, inhuman fangs "She's already dead."

 

"What?" The word dropped from Chris's mouth before he could stop it. His heart fell to his stomach. "No."

 

"Yes, Chrissy. We caught her trying to sneak into the Manor. She was trying to go back to save _you_ , can you believe that? Even our little sister knew that I'm beyond saving, but you refuse to accept it. And now it's got her killed! Oh, how she screamed!" Wyatt sucked in a breath.

 

"You should have heard her, clawing and kicking at every demon that came close. But," Wyatt sighed, "it wasn't enough in the end. She died like a true Charmed One did. Not like you, lying on a bed, wasting away."

 

Chris inhaled slowly, even as he felt a pressure grow on his chest. "You're wrong."

 

"What?"

 

Chris faced Wyatt head on. "You're wrong," he repeated. "You're not even real." Chris tapped a finger to his heart. "I can sense _my_ family, I know she's still alive. You're not even here."

 

The hallucination laughed, bitterly. "Oh Chris. I'm not here right now," he darkened, the shadows that Wyatt liked to lounge in making him appear far more menacing as they wrapped around him like a cape. "But I will be," he promised.

 

Red and brown blobs hovered over him. His blurry vision made it difficult to make much else out. Was he dead now? Was he seeing Tam and his mother? No, Chris decided. His mother had been starting to go grey the last time he saw her alive. The perks of raising three witch lighters with an absent, Elder ex-husband, he supposed.

 

Chris pushed that thought away. Thinking of his mom still hurt, even in the past where he could see her – younger and not his mom – walking and talking and living. He didn't want to be mad at Leo anymore, either. Either Leo. It probably wasn't good for his current state, however that was at the moment.

 

Who was over him? He wondered. Why was he lying down? He knew he was sick but… was he on a bed? That made sense.

 

"Chris?"

 

For a second, Chris panicked, but then he got a hold of himself. Wyatt wasn't here, he wasn't real. And that had been a woman's voice. A familiar woman's voice.

 

"Phoebe?" He croaked.

 

A cool hand over his forehead was the reply to that. He sighed in relief. Phoebe and Paige. And Wyatt. Little Wyatt. Chris could feel the tiny baby hands of his older brother poking at him earnestly, now that he knew he was awake.

 

He was safe. He was with his family. At least his family in the past.

 

Phoebe gasped when Chris shot up straight. "Mel," he gasped, then he slumped into himself, too weak to sit up straight. Phoebe caught him before he could fall and gently lowered him down. Or tried to.

 

"No," Chris murmured weakly but lucidly, unlike last time. "I need to… she's here, Phoebe. _Here._ "

 

"Who's here, Chris?" Phoebe asked, still trying to push him down and stop him from hurting himself.

 

"My sister," Chris groaned as pain shot through his body from the sudden movement. There was a crashing sound upstairs and an inhuman shriek. "She's here," Chris moaned. Mel was in the past, and so were a whole load of demons, by the sounds of it. Fantastic.


	12. Chapter 12

Phoebe paused in the act of pushing Chris down when the sounds of a fight filtered down to them through the floorboards. She took a moment to worry about Piper. She only had the moment considering that her white lighter was still struggling against her. Chris wasn’t very strong at the moment, but Phoebe didn’t want to hurt him when he was already so weak.

 

“She’s not alone,” Paige told Chris. She bounced Wyatt in her arms. When Chris had moved suddenly, she had grabbed the toddler and pulled him away just in case he fell off the bed. At least it made her feel a little less useless while Phoebe was trying to calm Chris. “She was with two other women and three men.”

 

Phoebe didn’t miss the little look that Paige shot her out of the corner of her eye. She would need to interrogate her little sister over _that_ once this situation was over. She hadn’t missed how strange she was when she was trying to get Leo upstairs. “Piper will look after her, Chris. She’ll be fine,” she tried to reassure him. Internally, Phoebe’s mind was whirring about the knowledge that Chris had a sister. Mel, that was short for Melinda – as in Melinda Warren, their ancestor.

 

She wanted to believe that she was just making up connections where they weren’t, but in her heart, Phoebe knew that she wasn’t.

 

She pressed her hand to Chris’s forehead again, it had seemed to calm him down the last time. She winced at the heat pouring off of him. “Chris, you need to lie down. You’ve been poisoned,” she reminded him. “You can’t just jump around, it’s making you worse.”

 

“I _can’t_ ,” Chris snapped. “She’s my sister.”

 

“Chris -” Phoebe was ready to sit on Chris to hold him down but the skin to skin contact with him made her empathy powers abruptly act up. Chris was normally such a closed book to her that the sudden rush of emotion made her gasp.

 

Panic. Pain, not all physical. Loss. Love. Fear. So much fear. Panic. Worry. Annoyance. Panic.

 

He was really panicking.

 

Phoebe made a grab for Chris he could move again. Maybe it was her sudden empathy link with him, but she knew that he was about to orb away before he did it. “Chris, no!” She ordered, firmly.

 

Chris ignored her. He tried to orb. Tried, being the operative word. Blue orbs swirled around Chris but disappeared just as quickly as Chris curled forwards with a muted cry of pain.

 

Wyatt cried in response and tried to struggle out of Paige’s arms. In vain, she tried to quieten him down while Phoebe tried to soothe Chris.

 

It didn’t work.

 

Upstairs, the sounds of fighting continued, drowning them out in the sea of demon shouting and witches attacking.

* * *

 

After what felt like hours, the last demon fell. He was either shot by one of PJ’s arrows, stabbed by Matt’s dagger or struck by Cole’s fireball. It was hard to tell. All Mel knew was that it hadn’t been her, or her parents-who-were-not-yet-her-parents.

 

Said not-yet-parents turned to each other once the fighting ended. Mel ignored them for the moment. She took in the condition of her family.

 

Henry was still on the ground, looking decidedly green at all the demon bits scattered around the room, but otherwise he was no more hurt than he had been. Matt had done his job exceptionally well.

 

The half-demon in question met her eyes when she saw him. He offered a tight smile. One hand was curled tightly around his upper right arm. She could just about make out the blood oozing down his arm among the demon gunk. Other than that, he was unhurt.

 

Mel smiled back at him, relieved.

 

PJ had fared better than Matt. She looked incredibly haggard and exhausted, but she was still grinning. The half-cupid loved fighting, and this had probably been a particular challenge for her. Especially since they usually made PJ act as a sniper with her bow. She was as well trained in hand-to-hand as any of them, probably more so, but she was the best of the resistance at long range fighting.

 

Kat had a long bleeding cut across her cheek and she seemed even more tired than PJ, but Mel suspected that it was just fear. Losing Tam so suddenly, and with Henry still injured, was probably upsetting her more than any injury she might have.

 

The final member of their travelling party, Cole, was doing his very best to make himself unseen. While Mel hadn’t been looking, Cole had slunk over to Henry Jr. With Matt’s help, he was trying to pull Henry to his feet. It wasn’t working.

 

Mel hurried over to join them and barely hid a gasp at the stabbing pain in her stomach. She bit back a moan of pain, wrapping her arms around her middle. A warmth spread against her arms.

 

Hesitantly, she pulled away one arm to glance down at her filthy shirt. She could see a slowly growing stain of red. She hadn’t even felt anything. It must have been a small weapon, she mused. Probably a knife, rather than an arrow, she clinically noted.

 

Then the pain hit. Mel bit back a scream. She had been stabbed before. Stabbed. Shot with an arrow. Shot by a gun. Sliced by broken glass. Even struck by lightning by an overzealous Elder – an Elder who hadn’t even lived long enough to realise the foolishness of his mistake in attacking a child of a Charmed One and an Elder. But none of it had hurt like this.

 

It wasn’t her pain, Mel knew instantly. She hadn’t felt any connection to Chris since he had stepped through the portal to the past. Now, it seemed as though that link was trying to make her feel every moment of the pain Chris had experienced since then.

 

With a careful inhale, Mel straightened. She adjusted her stance, tightening her hold around her middle. If this was the second-hand version of what Chris was feeling, then Mel didn’t want to imagine the full experience.

 

She walked as normally as she could manage over to stand next to Matt. With PJ’s help, he and Cole had gotten Henry standing up and now he was being fussed over by Kat.

 

“We need to get to Chris. Now,” she hissed into Matt’s ear.

 

Concerned eyes swept over her. Matt’s mouth tightened as he noticed the way she was holding her stomach. “Mel…” he murmured, to not draw attention to her.

 

“Now, Matthew,” she replied, sliding a hand into his as to drag him if she needed. Unfortunately, Leo stopped her.

 

“What is Cole doing here?” He demanded.

 

“We’re here for Chris,” PJ explained, swiftly moving to shield Cole from any attacks from Leo.

 

“We’re his family,” Kat added.

 

“His family?” Leo repeated, doubtfully.

 

“Why are you here now?” Piper asked, before Leo could say anything else.

 

Mel was grateful for her mom’s interruption. Just because she and her father was on civil terms again, and she knew that either of their deaths would devastate the other, didn’t mean that the years of unresolved issues and anger with the Elder would disappear. She didn’t want to explode at the man when it would only upset the situation even further.

 

“We found out that Chris was poisoned,” Cole explained. “The cure hasn’t been found yet. The poison isn’t even known about yet.”

 

“How did you know that Chris had been poisoned?” Leo asked, suspiciously.

 

Mel swallowed. “Wyatt told us,” she said. “After he…” she couldn’t say it.

 

“After he killed my sister,” Kat spoke up. Her voice sounded strong, but Mel could see her shaking out of the corner of her eye. She could see Henry grab her hand to offer support while they dealt with their shared grief. Tam wasn’t even dead a day but they all still had to carry on and keep carrying on no matter what.

 

“We can’t let him kill Chris too,” PJ stated. “Wyatt sent demons back in time to kill Chris, to stop him before Chris can stop Wyatt from even becoming the man he is. Chris can’t save Wyatt if he dies here, and you can’t save Chris without our help.”

 

“But who are you?” Leo asked. “Who’s Chris, for that matter? Why does he care so much about saving Wyatt when he could have killed him just as easily?”

 

Cole sighed. “We don’t know how that could affect our future. We don’t know how many lives could be erased without Wyatt being there.”

 

“He wasn’t always the monster we know him as,” Mel added. “We all used to love him once.”

 

Piper stared at her. “Who are you? How do you know my son?” She asked quietly.

 

“Wyatt’s not important right now,” Matt said. “We need to focus on Chris. Where is he?”

 

It was reassuring, terrifying, and painful all at once to see the fiercely protective mother in Piper. Her mother was in that woman, even if she wasn’t her mother yet.

 

“You can’t see Chris.”

* * *

 

“You can’t see Chris,” Piper snapped, her mothering instincts were flaring up.

 

Someone needed to protect Chris, she couldn’t know for certain if Chris really was related to these people. She couldn’t deny that the girl she had fought alongside, Mel, was very similar to Chris, but she could just be a shapeshifting demon of some kind. She couldn’t trust these strangers, not with Chris’s life.

 

“Piper, please,” Cole begged. “We want to help Chris. We care about him just as much as you do, possibly more,” he added when Mel scoffed.”You need our help to save him.”

 

“We’re going to save him, with or without your help,” Mel snapped.

 

“But, things will be easier for us all - especially Chris - if we work together,” Cole cut in. “We just want to help him.”

 

Piper, as a rule, didn’t trust Cole. She didn’t like him. But she couldn’t deny that he seemed genuine in his concern for Chris, and for the other children around him. And them for him. The girl with the bow in particular was physically shielding him from any harm.

 

“Speaking of help,” the red head spoke up. “Leo? Feeling like being useful?” She pointed at Henry.

 

Piper shared a look with Leo, who looked unimpressed at being ordered around, but he still moved over to heal first Henry, then the red head, then the other man and finally Mel, who had turned very pale by that point.

 

The man stuck close to Mel, their hands touching. Piper kept a close eye on them. She recognised their readiness to orb or shimmer away. She wasn’t going to let them anywhere near Chris until she was sure of who these people were.

 

“Piper?” The man said. “I know this is all hard to get your head around, but Cole is… maybe not good, but he’s helping us. Kat and Henry have just lost their sister because of Wyatt, they want to help Chris stop that happening again more than anything. So does PJ. She lost her mother to Wyatt’s tyranny. Chris is one of my oldest friends. My best friend. I’ve known him his entire life. Mel is his sister, she’s not going to let anyone hurt him.”

 

“You’ve known Chris your whole life?” Leo repeated, curious. “Who are you?”

 

The man hesitated. “I… I’m Matt. I…” he looked at Piper. “You’ve met my father. Derek?” He looked pained at the name, but his gaze didn’t waver.

 

Piper recognised the name. The man who had turned himself into a monster to save his son. She remembered that his eyes were human. They matched the man in front of her.

 

 _A half demon and a half whitelighter being friends? Best friends?_ Piper certainly hadn’t imagined the future being like that. Although, she mused, she preferred the thought that Chris was friends with a half-manticore rather than Cole’s child. Even if that would only be a quarter-demon.

 

“You’re the manticore baby,” Piper said.

 

The man shrugged, self-consciously. “Half-manticore. And my dad named me Matt,” he added. For good measure he flicked out his forked tongue.

 

Piper frowned. “Were you Wyatt’s friend?” She wondered.

 

Matt tensed and shared a look with Mel. “Yes,” he said, after a long moment. He sounded as pained as he did when he mentioned his father. What had happened to her darling baby boy? These people claimed to have loved him, but they called him a monster.

 

“Enough about Wyatt,” Mel snapped. “We need to find some way to save Chris. And nothing is going to stop me from getting to my brother.”

 

A flurry of orbs swarmed in front of Mel who, baffled, was left holding Wyatt in her arms. She stared down at him, slack jawed while Wyatt giggled. “Wow, you’re small,” Mel muttered.

 

“And blonde,” Matt observed. “His hair gets darker,” he added, taking Wyatt from Mel’s awkward hold.

 

Piper moved forward and took Wyatt from Matt. It was promising that his shield didn’t go up around the time travellers, but she didn’t want to leave Wyatt or Chris alone with them. Mel was still staring, in awe, at Wyatt. Piper imagined that it was weird to see someone that you only knew as an adult, as a toddler. Something niggled at the back of her mind. Mel was Chris’ sister, had she been Wyatt’s friend too? Another witch-lighter? Surely they had known of each other.

 

Although… something about Mel’s expression. Piper could see Chris in it. But she could see something else. Someone else.

 

The image of a little girl came to mind. A little girl in the Manor, playing with a dollhouse. A little girl named Melinda. Melinda. Mel.

 

Piper wasn’t sure where the name Chris came from, but she was sure that his parents had a reason.

 

Her gaze flickered to the others assembled. The girl with the bow, PJ, had Phoebe’s cheekbones. And she had the ‘P’. So did Chris, Piper remembered. Chris Perry. She had wanted to name Wyatt Prudence Melinda. Had she reversed it for her daughter?

 

No, Piper thought. She refused to jump to conclusions. She was just concerned about her white-lighter, as any charge would be. Her maternal instincts had latched onto Chris to look after - God knows that someone had to - and now she was jumping to conclusions. She had always wanted more than one child, and she was starting to worry about her biological clock. That was all, she insisted.

 

But, Kat’s sharp eyes were the exact same as Paige’s.

 

No, Piper repeated. She was just seeing things. But the thought remained. Was Chris hers?


	13. Chapter 13

Phoebe jumped to her feet when Wyatt disappeared in a swirl of orbs. "Paige?" She said. Paige nodded and orbed away. She hoped that Wyatt had only gone to the attic. She wasn't sure what they would do if Wyatt was missing and Chris was dying.

 

Chris had wasted most of his energy in his failed attempt at orbing and his struggles to get up. Now he was weak and quiet. Phoebe preferred him not fighting, but she wished that he wasn't so still. It made his wheezing and gasping breaths sound louder.

 

Phoebe turned when she heard the tingling sound of orbs behind her, expecting it to be Leo or Paige. Or Wyatt. But it wasn't. She jumped to her feet, ready to fight. There was a brunette woman behind her. Phoebe had never seen her before.

 

"Who are you?" She demanded, when the woman didn't move to fight. Instead her dark eyes were fixed on Chris, with a worried expression on her face.

 

The woman's eyes flicked up to Phoebe and twisted even more, for a second, into an expression of grief before she pulled a stoic mask over her face. Phoebe had seen Chris do the exact same thing so many times that it was unnerving.

 

"I'm Chris' sister, Mel," the woman said, then she tried to push past Phoebe.

 

Phoebe blocked her. She didn't know this woman and she couldn't just take her word for it. "Prove it," she demanded, uncertain of how Mel could. She had orbed down her, which proved that she was a whitelighter, but was she a witchlighter like Chris?

 

Mel frowned. "How?" She asked. "I can't use my powers in front of you. Future consequences, and all that," she said.

 

Phoebe almost laughed, but she could still hear Chris' wheezing behind her and it smothered any amusement that she felt. As did the figure that rushed down the stairs from the attic.

 

"Cole?" She gasped. Mel tensed, and Phoebe felt a sudden stab of betrayal. Paige had been looking at her oddly when she came from the attic. This was why. She had known that Cole was up there.

 

Cole raised his hands in surrender. "Phoebe, don't. I know that this is hard, believe me, I know. But I came here for Chris. I'm trying to help."

 

"How are you still alive?" Phoebe demanded.

 

Cole scowled. "It's complicated, I'm sorry. I'm not alive right now - in this time period. I'm from the future. I'm a friend of Chris and his family."

 

"Do I know that? Do we know that? Does Chris know what you are?"

 

Cole opened and closed his mouth several times. "We - you and me - we made our peace with what happened before you..."

 

Phoebe frowned as Cole trailed off. "'Before I' what?"

 

"The future is a very different place, Phoebe," Mel muttered. "Things have changed. People have changed. Cole is a friend, of us and, once, of you."

 

Phoebe didn't know if she believed it, but it was as likely as her beautiful little nephew becoming evil. Also as worrying was the thought that she was dead in Chris' time. They were all talking about her in past tense and the woman, Mel, had seemed grieved to see her again.

 

"M - Phoebe?"

 

Phoebe looked at the stairs to see another brunette hurrying down the stairs, clutching a bow in one hand.

 

"Cole's telling the truth. He really has changed. Will change. He's a good man. You trusted him. He becomes like a second father to your children. They love him. You love him. He changes," she said.

 

"PJ," Cole muttered.

 

The girl, PJ, shook her head. As she came close, Phoebe could see the tears in her eyes. Her heart ached, in the same way it had earlier. According to this girl, she would have children, and Cole would look after them when she died. She would die young, like her mother.

 

PJ swallowed loudly. "Oh, please don't cry," she pleaded. "It always set me off too." She hurried forward and threw her arms around Phoebe.

 

Phoebe reprociated the hug, blinking back her own tears, and she noticed Cole doing the same. She couldn't imagine a future where she could ever truly love Cole again, but it was clear that he loved this girl. Maybe he could change. Would change.

* * *

Paige orbed into the attic to see Piper holding Wyatt and talking quietly with Leo. The girl with the bow, Cole, and the girl covered in demon bits had disappeared down the stairs, eventually followed by the older man, leaving the red head and the other man alone.

 

Paige approached them, uncertain. They both looked lost, without their family to hid behind. Paige remembered that feeling. The pair watched her closely.

 

"I'm Paige," she introduced.

 

The man smiled. "We know."

 

"Because I'm a Charmed One, or because I'm Wyatt's aunt?" She asked.

 

The man's smile twitched. "Both," he said, "and neither. We… we know you anyway."

 

"All half-whitelighters know each other," the woman said. "But we're pretty close."

 

"I'm Henry," the man said. "This is my sister, Kat."

 

Paige nodded. "You're both half-whitelighters?"

 

Henry shook his head. "No. I'm adopted. A mere mortal."

 

Kat scoffed. "'Mere'," she repeated, sarcastically.

 

Henry shrugged bashfully. "Okay, maybe I have other uses," he said while Kat rolled her eyes.

 

"So, the future," Paige said. "How do I look? I'm allowed to know that, aren't I?"

 

Kat shrugged. "It's a hard life. But, all things considered, you look pretty good." She beamed at her, making her smile.

 

"Am I allowed to ask about my family? Any kids? A man?"

 

Kat's smile fell into something sad. "Yeah," she murmured. "You have kids. Three. You're a great mom, too. And Dad - the dad, he's great too. You really love each other."

 

Paige nodded. "Are you two alright?" She asked.

 

Kat shook her head. Henry put an arm around her shoulder. "Sorry," he said. "We just lost our sister. Kat's twin. She… she changed sides a long time ago, but she died to warn us about Chris. She… we saw it happen."

 

"I'm so sorry," Paige said. She wasn't sure what to do. She felt like she should hug them, she had wanted a hug after her parents had died. But, she wasn't sure if she should. She had certainly attacked anyone who came too close when she was grieving.

 

"We know," Kat muttered. "You were there too. It… it was hard on us all."

 

Paige decided to go with her instincts and hug the pair. Henry cried quietly while Kat stayed tense and shaking, like she had been. She would need to do something about her grief. Paige had acted out when her parents died, until she finally broke down. Hopefully that wouldn't happen to Kat.

* * *

 

Chris felt like he couldn't breathe, like the air was slowing being sucked out of the room. His skin burned. His blood boiled. Still, he shivered. He felt as though his teeth would rattle out of his head. He didn't feel as though he would be strong enough to pick them back up.

 

He felt weak.

 

If he were in his own time, Chris was sure that he would be dead. In his future, with the lack of whitelighters, and medicine, illnesses were a death sentence. During flu seasons, Chris did nothing but conduct solo demon hunts and reconnaissance. There weren't enough people to do raids with, to rescue their people, to take down Wyatt's strongholds. Instead, Chris used the time to prepare for future missions. And wait for his own death. He owed it to his mother, to his aunt, to his uncles and grandpa to die better. He owed it to his sister, cousins and fellow Resistance members to keep fighting.

 

For a moment, Chris thought that the faces above him were hallucinations to remind him of that fact, until Mel reached out and touched him. He flinched at the cool touch, but couldn't stop the smile that spread across his face.

 

"Mel," he murmured. "Matt. What are you doing here?"

 

Matt pressed a cool hand to Chris' forehead. "Well, we couldn't let you have all the fun, Chris. Things are boring back home. And none of your cousins like my jokes," he joked.

 

Mel rolled her eyes. "We're here to help you," she said. "You're very sick."

 

"I noticed," Chris gasped.

 

Mel slapped him lightly. It was more of a quick tap to the chest. "Don't joke, Chris. This is serious. It was Ryake. He sent back Lokl and Jarik to do it. We've killed him, but we don't know where his brother is. They're probably guarding the cure, especially since they probably know we're here now. It wouldn't surprise me if they had a way to communicate. Pair demons always do."

 

Chris nodded, slowly wrapping his mind around that. "Is everyone okay?" He asked. "Who's here?"

 

"Henry got hurt when we first portalled here. We bumped into Ryake. And there was a bit of a tussle in the attic, but Leo healed us. We're all fine now," Matt said.

 

Mel shot him a look. She probably hadn't wanted to tell him anything about that. As to not 'worry' him. As though he wasn't always worrying about them.

 

"Who's…?" He tried to ask again, but Mel picked it up before he could finish.

 

"Well, there's me and Matt. PJ, Kat, Henry and Cole are here too."

 

"Cole?" Chris repeated.

 

Mel nodded. "Yeah, we're all already regretting that decision. It's made things much harder."

 

Chris scoffed. "Harder than seeing Mom and Aunt Phoebe?" He asked. "Harder than seeing how carefree Paige was before Uncle Henry died? It's one thing to remember…"

 

Mel looked away.

 

Chris swallowed. "Tam," he murmured. "She's dead, isn't she?" Mel nodded. "Wyatt?" She nodded again.

 

"She was the one who told us what happened."

 

Chris squeezed his eyes shut. "Why would she do that? Stupid."

 

Mel was scowling when he opened his eyes again. "She loved you, Chris. We all love you. None of us want to see you hurt. Except you."

 

Chris rolled his eyes. Of course she was going to give out to him now. He was on his deathbed. Mel hit him again, clearly guessing that thought.

 

Matt looked between them. "What? Chris? Mel? What are you talking about? Chris, what did you do?"

 

Mel glared at him. "Leo had Elder powers," she explained. "In our timeline, Dad didn't become an Elder until Chris was a year old. That's when Mom and Dad's relationship started going bad. They got through it to make me, but Chris…"

 

Matt turned on him. "Chris did you risk your own existence!?" He demanded.

 

"Doesn't matter," Chris protested.

 

"Like hell it 'doesn't matter', Chris!" Matt exclaimed. "Do you know what your dad said before we left? He said that he would prefer to have you and Mel, safe, in the future, then have Wyatt saved in the past."

 

Chris paused in his retort. That didn't sound like the Leo he had grown up with. His father had always believed that Wyatt was most important. What had happened since he had been gone?

 

"We're losing, Chris," said Mel, quietly. "It doesn't matter if we kill Wyatt, destroy his empire. We've still lost Mom. We've still lost our whole family. We've still lost Bianca," she added, even quieter.

 

Chris shut his eyes to hide from the memory of his fiance. He missed her everyday, but he tried to pretend that she wasn't gone forever, that she was just in the future. She was just somewhere else, and one day they would be together again. That was why he needed to save Wyatt. He needed to make a better future for him and Bianca.

 

"If this kills me," Chris began.

 

"It won't," Matt interrupted. "We won't let it."

 

Chris shot Matt a glare and continued. "If this, or something else, kills me, I need one of you to keep going. We need to save Wyatt." He swallowed. "Save him or kill him. Save our future."

 

"Chris," Mel said, softly.

 

"Promise me, Mel," Chris interrupted. "Promise me that if I die, someone will take on the job. We need to save Wyatt. For Aunt Phoebe, for Tam, for Mikey, for Uncle Coop, Henry, Derek, for Grandpa, for Bianca. For me."

 

Mel sucked in a breath. She pressed her lips to his forehead, no doubt feeling the incredible heat burning through him. She whispered, "I promise."


	14. Chapter 14

Once the initial shock had somewhat worn off - for the Charmed Ones, the Charmed Children could never come to terms with seeing their deceased parents and aunts, and seeing them so young - they all broke into teams to discuss their plan.

Henry and Paige had gone to put Wyatt to bed for a short nap. PJ was bonding with Phoebe while Matt made sure that she didn’t blurt out anything too dangerous to their futures, while he pretended to watch over Chris, and Kat and Mel gathered in the attic to peruse the Book of Shadows, trying to see if there was any mention of the more notable Archer Demons mentioned in the Book of Shadows. Their demonic education tended to be more focused on the present rather than the past, so they had to see who was alive and wasn’t yet alive.

Mel shook her head. “I can’t believe any of this,” she muttered, keeping her voice low to avoid being overheard. “Being back in the Manor, seeing my mom, seeing Chris,” she shook her head again. “Running straight in Ryake, Wyatt, knowing that Javik is dead, and now Lokl. It’s just crazy.”

Kat wrapped her arms around her. “I can’t believe that Tam’s just gone. And I came so close to losing Henry.”

Mel sighed. “Kat,” she said softly, wrapping her arms around her younger cousin. She wasn’t the most empathetic or comforting among the Charmed Children, but she understood the pain of losing your family all too well. “We’re going to fix this. We’re going to stop the evil, stop Wyatt, and we’ll save Tam before any of this even happens,” she promised.

Kat nodded. “I know,” she agreed.

Mel pulled back, glancing down at the Book. “I’m not recognising a lot of names, I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not. Maybe the others killed them all before our time, or maybe they’re already dead by now and no one’s done any spring cleaning in the Book for years.” She sighed, running a hand over their birthright.

Kat sniffed. “Tammy was always good at that.”

Mel nodded sadly. “Yeah,” she sighed. “She had the best handwriting out of any of us.”

“And the best drawing skills,” Kat added. “I miss her, Mel. I know she wasn’t around for years, but now… I can’t feel her anymore. She’s just… gone.”

“I know, Kat. I know,” Mel sympathised. “It hurts. But, you will get through this. We’ve lost people like this before, and we’ve survived it. We’ll get through this and stop the evil from turning Wyatt.”

Kat sniffed again. “Wyatt is the evil!” She snapped. “He’s the one we need to stop.”

Mel shook her head. “Kat, we’re tried. It won’t work. He’s too protected. He knows our powers too well. And we can’t trust anyone else to do it. No one else is powerful enough and anyone who gets close to powerful enough, he has them killed.”

“He’s protected in our time, but what about _this_ time,” Kat hissed. “He’s a toddler. He couldn’t protect himself. Not from all of us. He might be Twice-Blessed and powerful, but we grew up learning his weaknesses, it’s our job. It’s our duty to stop him.”

“Kat, he’s a child,” Mel warned, shocked at her cousin, and also not shocked. The idea had crossed her mind a few times. She had discussed it with Chris, but they both knew that it was a last resort. Neither of them wanted to kill their brother, but they also knew that the repercussions on their timeline would be disastrous. “He’s an innocent.”

“He killed my sister!”

“Our Wyatt killed your sister! The child downstairs has done nothing wrong! If you kill him, you will be killing good, and turning evil. Tam’s not alive to avenge yet! If you killed Wyatt now, what if the rest of us are never born? Tam will never even be alive!”

“At least then she’d never die!” Kat hissed, eye ablaze.

Mel bit back a snarl. Kat was grieving. She wasn’t thinking rationally. Not that rational thinking was ever her strong suit. “Kat, calm down,” she growled. “If we screw this up - which you trying to kill _their_ child would definitely do - then we won’t get a second chance. Chris will die, and Tam’s death will have been entirely in vain. Do you want that? Do you want your sister to have died for nothing? Because, I don’t,” Mel finished panting for breath.

Kat stepped back, eyes still ablaze but she looked calmer now. “Fine,” she spat, and then she orbed away, with no indication of where she was going.

Mel wanted to be worried, but she knew that she had a greater chance of slapping her younger cousin than comforting her. Kat had survived to this age without dying in a dystopian world, she would be fine in normal-day San Francisco.

* * *

 

On the other side of the attic, Piper and Leo were putting up a united front against Cole, who found the entire thing amusing, and a little depressing considering the state of their relationship in his memories. Although it was typical them to only grow stronger when one of their children was in danger. There was nothing like it to bring those two together.

“Okay, I get it. You don’t trust me again, I know why. I’m not going to tell you again, because you will eventually learn it all, you already have from my perspective. But, trust me for now that I have these kids’ best interests at heart. I have Chris’ best interests at heart,” Cole insisted. “I promised every member of those kids’ families that I would keep them safe - I already failed once. I refuse to fail again.”

Piper and Leo shared a look and Cole had to hide a smile. They never lost those ‘look’s. Chris and Mel did the same, but Piper and Leo could have a whole argument with only a single look. Piper’s kids never got to their parents’ level.

“Fine,” Piper huffed. “But don’t you dare try anything.”

“Or you’ll blow me up, I know,” Cole finished throwing up his hands.

“What did the demon tell you, Piper?” Leo asked.

“Lokl,” Cole cut in, before she could speak. “His name was Lokl, he was from the future. So if he told you that he wasn’t involved, then he was lying.”

“I guessed,” Piper snapped. “He said that he was working for someone, and he knew about some sort of ‘temporary’ cure.”

Cole nodded. “He was probably working for Wyatt, but there has to be a higher level demon running things on this end. It certainly wasn’t Lokl, his brother was always the brains of that operation.”

“Forget who’s in charge, if you know where the cure is, why don’t we just go find it?” Piper demanded.

Cole raised his hands again. “Look, I don’t want Chris in pain either, but you have no idea how many Archer demons there are, they’ve probably already created a couple dozen spawn in the time since we’ve arrived. We need to stop their leader to disorient the group and that takes time. The temporary cure is just that, but it’ll give Chris a much better chance. And, he’s one of the best fighters that we have. It wouldn’t hurt to have him fighting the demons with us.”

Leo was shaking his head. “Chris can’t even get up, there’s no way he can fight.”

Cole scowled. “You don’t know Chris. And this temporary cure is good, they used to deal it out instead of the real one - convince people that they were fine long enough to slink back into the Underworld. It gives us time. We need it.”

Neither one of the couple looked entirely convinced, until Mel sauntered over, glancing uncertainly between her parents when they couldn’t see her, but behaving every inch the Resistance leader that she was when they could.

“Cole’s right. Chris needs time. And so do we, according to the Book, we’ve missed something big. There’s a second time travel portal, as long as that one is open,” she pointed to the chalk drawing of the trifecta left on the attic wall, “there’s one open in the Underworld. For all we know, they’ve gotten every demon in the city flooding down there right now. We need to think before we act.”

Cole was impressed, Mel’s parents were less so.

“Fine,” they both grudgingly agreed.

“But how do we do this?” Piper wondered.

“You seem to have developed some planning skills, Cole,” Leo said, sounding somewhat accusing, which was fair considering Leo’s history with him, but Cole still took offence to considering how many of his plans had saved his children’s lives.

“Well, we’ll need the group to work together, but we still need information. From what I remember, there are still plenty of Elders you can ask for help from,” Cole hinted.

Leo nodded. “I could talk to Gideon,” he offered.

Mel nodded in agreement but Cole couldn’t help but notice the frown that spread across her face. “Just… be careful, alright?” She said. “Gideon, he’s… I’ve heard things over the years. I’m not so sure about that guy.”

Leo looked bewildered but nodded. “Alright.”

* * *

 

Leo orbed into Gideon’s office in Magic School, surprised to not find the other Elder there. “Gideon?” He called out.

It took a moment, but Gideon orbed into the room behind him, looking surprised. “Leo,” he said. “I thought you would be busy dealing with your white-lighter.” He paused. “Chris Perry, he is alright, isn’t he?”

Maybe it was Mel’s warning, but Leo couldn’t help but feel that there was something ‘off’ about the way that Gideon asked about Chris.

“He’s fine for now, but we need to heal him. Soon. We’ve figured out that he’s been poisoned, with something called Marbas. And we know that there is a cure for it, somewhere.”

Gideon shook his head. “I’m sorry, Leo. I’m familiar with that poison. But no one has been able to find any cure for it, we don’t know if it even exists anymore. I’m sorry. No one deserves to die like that.”

Leo grit his teeth. “Surely, there’s something,” he pleaded. “There is a cure for it in the future.”

Gideon paused. “Chris told you that?”

Leo opened his mouth to say that it was Chris’ time travelling relatives, but, again, Mel’s warning ran through his mind. “Yes,” he said, instead. “And Piper captured an Archer demon who told her that one does exist, and that whoever is in charge might know it’s location. Do you have any idea who could be in charge? Or where it might be?”

“No, I’m afraid not,” Gideon sighed. “And healing isn’t working?” He asked.

Leo shook his head, with growing frustration. If Gideon didn’t know anything then there was no point in sitting around talking when he could be joining the others in helping Chris.

“Perhaps, Wyatt might be able to heal Chris,” Gideon suggested.

Leo startled. “Wyatt?” He repeated. Wyatt was powerful, but his healing wasn’t any stronger than an Elders, not yet anyway. “He’s not powerful enough. No one is.”

Gideon hummed. “Not powerful enough,” he muttered. “How powerful is he?” He wondered.

Leo took a small step back. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “We won’t know until he grows up. We can only teach him to control it.”

“But, can he control it, Leo?”

“He’s a child!” Leo snapped. “He still needs to learn.”

“But, will he?” Gideon wondered. “If what Chris says about his future is true, then Wyatt doesn’t learn to control his powers. And the entire world suffers.”

Leo couldn’t believe that that was true, and he suspected that Chris would argue against it too. In all the brief glimpses into his future that he let slip, he had never once implied that Wyatt’s powers were out of control. If anything, he had too much control over his powers, he was a true force of Evil, unstoppable by all the forces of good currently hiding out in the Manor.

Wyatt turning wasn’t about the strength of his powers, but rather the man who wielded them. The man that Leo would ensure would never turn evil.

“I’ll figure this out on my own, Gideon,” Leo said. “Thank you for the help.”

* * *

 

PJ had switched places with Matt a few moments ago, and was now sitting with her cousin’s head in her lap, brushing back his hair. She remembered Aunt Piper doing the same to her when her mom had had to go work and she was at home sick. She had probably done the same to her own children. She hoped that Chris would find it comforting.

She felt a strange mix of despair, elation, fear and excitement. She was home again, in the Manor, seeing her mother, but she knew how badly things would get. She knew that her mother only had a few years until she died. She knew that it was even less time for Piper, less time until Aunt Paige’s heart was broken. She knew what was coming, but now she could see exactly what they had to fight for. She could see that she hadn’t forgotten what her mother looked like, she hadn’t forgotten any of it. If they did this right, then this would all be theirs again.

They would run through these halls again, laugh with these people, be safe and loved and home again. But only if they did it right.

PJ didn’t even want to think about what would happen if they did it wrong. If Chris died. If Wyatt still turned evil. If their future still occurred. If poor Tammy died again.

PJ hadn’t been in the room when Tam died, and she grateful, because the shock wave from her own grief compounded by that from her siblings and her cousins had been immense. Even now, her own grief was wrapped up in the others, unable to be dealt with behind the worry and fear for Chris, for Wyatt, for themselves.

“I can hear you worrying, PJ,” Chris murmured.

PJ paused in her stroking and looked down at her older cousin with a fond smile. “Chris,” she said, softly. “How are you?” She could feel his pain and hurt through their Charmed bond and her own empathetic nature, even though that was dulled just enough to make her suspect a blocking potion.

Matt stood up from where he sat at the end of the bed talking to Phoebe. He squeezed Chris’ knee. “Hey, Chris. You’re sister is working on how to help you right now. We’re all focused on keeping you safe. So you better do that same,” he warned.

PJ smiled, well aware of how Chris was about his own illnesses, but as aware of how hypocritical that was coming from someone who had once challenged six demons - with three knives sticking out of him.

Chris smirked weakly. “Right,” he agreed, placatingly.

“Phoebe,” Henry called softly, the way people did at the bedside of the infirm. “Will you go to check on Wyatt? Apparently Kat’s run off, and I think Mel wants Paige to try find her.”

Phoebe nodded and got up. “Don’t worry, Chris,” she said before slipping out of the room passed her unknown nephew.

“Hey Chris,” Henry said, fondly, moving closer to his cousins and friend. “Long time no see, I just wished that you looked a little bit better.”

“You’re one to talk,” Chris croaked. “I heard Ryake nearly had you back at the Manor, what was that about?”

Henry rolled his eyes with an exaggerated sigh. “He snuck up on me. How can I fight demons that I’m woefully ill equipped to fight when they won’t fight fair?”

It was an old argument between the boys. Henry might not have to powers to fight, but he had the skills to keep himself alive, and the heart to never back down from a fight.

Chris laughed, which quickly turned to a painful sounding cough. “I’m sure you showed him in the end though,” Chris choked out.

“Not yet,” Henry promised, even though his face showed the clear worry he felt for his cousin.

PJ’s heart clenched with the shared worry among her cousins and friend.

“Listen,” Chris coughed again. “I want you all to be careful,” he began.

“Don’t worry, Chris,” Matt cut off. “I won’t let Henry damage his pretty face on Ryake’s fists.” Henry pretended to scowl.

“No,” Chris argued. “It’s not about that. It’s about our parents. Don’t let them know who any of us are. It could cause irreparable damage to our futures. We’re already in trouble in our own lives, we don’t need to ruin our timelines any more. Be careful,” he warned, having to cut himself off with a cough.

“We will,” PJ promised, squeezing Chris’ hand. “We’ll keep each other safe.”


	15. Chapter 15

It was a generally accepted fact about the Halliwell family that only the cupids, Henry and Wyatt were able to restore peace during an argument, unless one of the others backed down. Kat and Tam had always been as fiery as their hair, and Chris and Mel had inherited their mother’s explosiveness, only with their tempers instead. This was why it was a mildly unsettling sight to all to see Mel nod accommodatingly when Cole announced that she would be staying behind. 

 

Kat had returned from her storm out, looking very much like an angry teenager being dragged home by her mother - which was technically true on all points - and she had bitterly recounted her argument with Mel to Henry. If there was any risk to Wyatt, Cole had faith that Mel would stop it. And he knew that, no matter how much they loved him, no one would fight harder to keep Chris safe than Mel. Both of the Charmed sons were safest under the protection of their sister. Even Piper understood that, although not completely or without protests for Wyatt’s safety. 

 

Henry had solved that argument by offering to stay. He had argued that as a mortal he was more of a liability in the Underworld, but he was far less of a threat to Wyatt. With his shield up, there would be nothing Henry could do to hurt him, even less than Mel could attempt, and if anything happened Henry’s only option was to say and call for help, whereas Mel could run. She wouldn’t, certainly not without Henry and Chris, but the Charmed sisters weren’t certain of that yet. 

 

That left Paige, Phoebe, Piper, Matt, PJ, Kat and Cole to venture out into the Underworld. The time travellers automatically grabbed onto each other, used to letting Matt or Cole shimmer places rather than risk alerting anyone by orbing, leaving the three Charmed Ones to link arms with each other and follow. 

 

They orbed into a dimly lit cave that  was half full of baffled and scared demons. 

 

The group didn’t waste a second before the air was filled with potions, fireballs and everything else that they had in their arsenal. Screams rang throughout the cave and, within seconds, everyone lost track of each other. 

 

PJ did her best to watch her mother’s back and Kat cut down demon after demon trying to get to her mother’s side. Only Matt and Cole managed to avoid losing Piper, mainly because neither half-demon was willing to let Piper go off on her own. 

 

It felt like they had been fighting for hours and even the time travellers, who fought large packs of demons every other day, were beginning to grow tired and sluggish. That’s when Piper saw it. 

 

The cavern was surround by misshapen but solid rock, except for a small crack in the surface which was guarded by a small group of demons who seemed unwilling to move, even as those in the middle of the fray were being torn to pieces. They were guarding something, and she would bet she knew what. 

 

“Over there,” she shouted at Cole, who nodded to Matt and wordlessly explained the location. 

 

The trio shifted and began cutting and blasting their way through the throng. As they neared, Piper could see the antidote. It was an odd green liquid in a purple coloured glass jar. She was nearly within reaching distance. Or, she was. 

 

A demon shimmered in between her and the jar and threw her back. Piper hit the ground with a grunt, all the air rushing from her lungs. “Paige!” She gasped out. 

 

“Antidote!” Paige called, holding out her hand. The swirl of orbs formed and the jar appeared in her hand. 

 

The demon cackled. It was far uglier than the average demon, and that was saying something. One of its eyes were gone, replaced by an ugly, weeping hole in its head and its teeth were visible even when its mouth was closed. 

 

Piper threw up her hands to blow it up, but the demon was faster. A fireball whizzed through the air and would have killed her, only Matt jumped in between. The half-demon fell to the ground with a muted howl even as he threw his athemae at the demon. 

 

It dodged it like it was nothing, and then turned its attention to Paige. The energy ball it threw only hit her in the air, but it was enough. With a primal scream of rage, Kat threw herself at the demon, howling and screeching. But, the demon was still quicker, it shimmered away, immediately being replaced by another group of demons, ready to attack the frenzied witchlighter. 

 

“Paige! Do you have the potion?” Phoebe shouted over the screeches, as the surviving demons began to regroup. 

 

“Yeah” Paige replied. She gripped the potion with her injured arm and held onto the wound with the other hand. 

 

“Go, I’ll get Kat,” Cole announced, throwing a fireball and chasing after it to move into the throng of demons. 

 

PJ leapt at Phoebe, beaming away first. Paige shot Piper a reluctant look before orbing and Matt crawled over until he could grab at her ankle and shimmer. 

 

Within seconds of their disappearance, Cole had gathered a thankfully unhurt Kat by the scruff of her neck and shimmered after them, cursing the world, demons and the Charmed Ones the entire time. 

 

* * *

 

 

The Manor was unfamiliar when it was quiet. The last time Mel remembered it being this still was after Aunt Phoebe died. It was also one of the last times she remembered the Manor ever being home. From that day on, her home had been the relatives that followed after and, fairly soon after, led. This place was her home and it wasn’t in so many different ways that didn’t even have anything to do with time travel. 

 

“Do you think this will actually work?” She whispered to Chris, or more at him because she didn’t want to wake him up. 

 

She had been a child when Chris first suggested this plan, half a joke and half motivated by desperation. She was sure that Chris was argue that she was still a child, but by the time the plan had been looked at more seriously she had lost every friend she had ever known and buried too many family members, far from a child. The actual plan wasn’t motivated by any less desperation than the original suggestion was, but they had become used a base level of despair and unlikeliness that it went unremarked. 

 

No one had known for sure if the spell survived, or if it had ever truly existed. Paige and Leo talked about it, but Paige had never physically travelled back in time and Leo refused to give them information, too afraid to send his only Good son to his probable death. 

 

It had survived, and the plan worked, amazingly. But now they were facing new problems. The world was never kind enough to leave you with your victory, and certainly not if you were a Halliwell. 

 

Henry sat beside Chris on the bed, holding Wyatt in his arms. Mel wasn’t sure how to feel about her baby big brother. She couldn’t imagine that toddler doing anything evil, but then she couldn’t imagine the brother who had walked her to school doing anything evil, or the brother who had fixed her dollhouse for her, or the brother who had given her his ice-cream, or even the brother who had pushed her off the swings doing anything like the monster in the future did. 

 

“Are you okay, Henry?” Mel wondered. There was a lot of meaning behind that question, but even without any powers, Henry was fairly empathetic. He probably had to be to understand what went on in this family without losing his cool. 

 

Henry nodded, brushing a hand through Wyatt’s hair, almosting petting the toddler. “Yeah. I mean, I miss her, Mel, more than I ever imagined - but she died on the side of good, and I can be proud of her for that. If she had died evil, then it would be harder to mourn her because she wouldn’t deserve it. But she chose her family in the end, and I can hate a lot of what she did, but I can be proud of how she died, I can pretend that she’s up there with dad.”

 

“She did the right thing, in the end,” Mel agreed. “It doesn’t absolve her of what she did, but it means that maybe she could have been absolved, eventually.”

 

Henry nodded. “And she will be,” he said, certain. “When we save Wyatt, save Chris, save Tam - all the suffering will be undone. She will never make that choice.”

 

“You sound so sure. What if we fail?”

 

“We won’t. Chris won’t fail us. We won’t fail him. Good won’t fail Wyatt. We won’t fail this time.”

 

When Henry said it all so certain, Mel almost believed it. She almost allowed herself to believe it. 

 

Chris woke with a start. There was a crash upstairs. A howl. A familiar howl. 

 

Mel cursed. “Stay here,” she ordered the three boys before orbing up to the attic, relying on Wyatt’s shield to keep them safe. She held up her hands, ready to blow up whatever she saw. And then she saw him. 

 

Eye missing, skin missing, mouth gaping. Ryake. “You got uglier,” Mel commented, false bravado automatic even as her heart pounded. How the hell was he here?

 

Ryake grinned, grotesquely destroyed skin stretching and twisting in the process. “You’re not the only one who can open a portal, Melinda.” 

 

Mel grit her teeth. Ryake talked a big talk, but his face proved that he was just as vulnerable to her powers as anyone else. Her fingers twitched to kill him, but keeping him alive would be better. Wyatt’s second in command was loyal to no one but himself. With enough pressure, he would give up everything on the lord of all evil, or whatever he called himself these days. 

 

“I’m surprised you’re still here,” Ryake snarled. “Seeing as I just blew up your mommy and her little demon-mutts.”

 

Mel flinched. 

 

“He’s lying,” growled Chris. 

 

Mel startled. She tore her eyes away from the demon. “Chris!” She cried. Her brother was shaking and sweating, barely keeping his feet beneath him, but he was standing, every bit the leader of the Resistance. Ready to kill. 

 

Mel was so focused on Chris that she didn’t notice Ryake’s move to strike her until Chris flung out a hand and threw the demon through the air. Ryake fell with a sickening crack, doubtlessly even more damaged than a minute ago. But Chris fell too. Blood pouring from both nostrils as he struggled to breathe. 

 

Henry arrived at Chris’ side in a swirl of orbs before Mel could move, he looked surprised and bemused but the squirming blond in his arms explained his arrival fairly easily. Wyatt struggled until Henry dropped to his knees beside Chris and let his brother get his grubby little mitts on him. 

 

Wyatt babbled unhappily at his big little brother, sounding astoundingly similar to how he would as a teenager. 

 

Mel flicked her wrists at Ryake, almost absently, before she rushed over to Chris, dropping down at his side. Ryake shimmered away, less his left forearm, while no attention was on him, but she didn’t care. 

 

“Chris?” She pleaded, but Chris didn’t answer. 

 

Pale and gasping for breath, Chris didn’t move.

 

* * *

 

 

The world around him was white. There was no obvious temperature. If it ever felt too cold, the temperature would raise to warm, if it ever felt too warm, the temperature would shift to cold. It was a world designed for comfort, even if there was nothing of note in it. 

 

Chris felt untethered, drifting from thought to thought. Sensation to sensation. Occasionally bursts of pain and fear filtered through the white haze, but it didn’t feel painful. It was just information to his brain, telling him that there was hurt, but it was as though he couldn’t be bothered to feel it. 

 

“That doesn’t sound like my nephew.”

 

Chris didn’t recognise the voice. He only had two aunts, and that wasn’t either one of them talking. 

 

“I believed in  _ you,  _ Chris. The least that you could do is keep fighting for me.”

 

He knew that voice. He knew it far too well. He missed it too keenly. Everytime he closed his eyes, everytime he imagined a future where he succeeded, where he failed. Every time he saw two people who loved each other. “Bianca?”

 

“I’m here, Chris. I’m here for you, but I need you to do something for me. For all of us.”

 

“Anything,” he promised, looking around the white room for Bianca, but not able to find her. 

 

“You need to hold on.”

 

“Hold onto what?” He wondered, looking down at his hands. What was there to hold onto. 

 

“Life, Chris,” said the first voice. “You need to hold onto life. You need to keep going. You’re almost there, I promise.”

 

“We’re all here supporting you, Chris. Even if you can’t see us,” said Bianca. “You’re never alone in this fight.”

 

“All you need to do is keep fighting.”

 

“Fighting what?” Chris asked. But then he felt it. The pain from before, but real, attacking every nerve ending and receptor. His bones felt like they were burning, his blood boiling, his eyes bleeding, his brain crawling. He was dying. 

 

“No, not yet you’re not,” said the first voice. “Not while I have a say in it.”

 

Chris looked up into bright green eyes that were just like his own before the black rushed in, dragging him from the peaceful white room down into a wave of darkness and life. 

 

Aunt Prue?


	16. Chapter 16

Shimmering was less comfortable than orbing, Piper noticed. Or maybe it was down to the state of the half-demon clinging to her leg. Matt was sprawled out on the floor but he was already carefully pulling himself up to his feet, wincing but not seriously harmed.

 

Cole shimmered in after them, holding a seething Kat, who was struggling and snarling against his hold. He released her immediately only so that she could go to Paige, who had arrived seconds before.

 

“Guys!” PJ called, worriedly.

 

Piper turned around and gasped. Mel, Henry and Wyatt surrounded Chris who didn’t appear to be moving. Tears streamed down Mel’s face as she tried to shake Chris awake. “Is he…?” Piper couldn’t finish.

 

PJ shook her head. “Not yet, but we’re almost out of time.”

 

Paige shrugged off Kat’s hands and handed the antidote to Henry who, with fumbling fingers, opened it, and poured it down Chris’s throat carefully.

 

Mel wiped at the skin where Henry had spilled the liquid and watched with bated breath for any sign of recovery. In her head, she knew that the poison had been running through his veins for too long. He wouldn’t fully recover unless they fully cured him. It would take time for this cure to work, he wouldn’t get worse, but he wouldn’t get better. But her heart wanted more. She wanted Chris to wake up and smile at her, talk to her, give out to her for letting her guard down with the demon. She just wanted him to be okay.

 

“What happened?” Paige asked, noticing the puddle of blood that Ryake had left.

 

Mel sniffed. “Ryake attacked the house. Chris saved me.”

 

“He was in the Underworld too,” PJ said. “Just before he left. He must have come straight here.”

 

Mel nodded. “He said that he killed you guys,” she recounted, glancing at her mother, Cole and Matt, who was still bleeding.

 

Henry squeezed her shoulder in comfort. “I think we should move Chris downstairs. He’ll be more comfortable there.”

 

Mel grabbed Chris’ hand and orbed down back down to Piper’s bedroom, settling her brother on the bed.

 

Piper scooped Wyatt up from Henry’s arms to let him rise to his feet. “What happened in the Underworld?” He asked, looking between Paige and Matt’s injuries and Kat’s shaking fury.

 

Cole shook his head, rolling his shoulders and stretching out his tired muscles. “There were a lot more demons than expected. And then Ryake attacked. It was close.”

 

Kat let out a quiet stream of curses in response to that as she healed first her mother and then her friend. “I’ll kill him,” she promised.

 

“He’s probably down an arm at this point so I think you’ve a good shot,” Henry pointed out, nodding to the blood stain.

 

Kat growled again and stormed off, walking off rather than orbing away this time.

 

Henry sighed sadly. “I should go after her.”

 

“No, let me,” said PJ. “I think she needs to blow off some steam, she can’t do that with you.” She nodded at Cole and followed after her cousin, charging him with coming up with the next phase of their plan.

 

For a long moment, Cole silently floundered so Piper took charge. “Alright, so we’re assuming that this cure thing works for now. What’s next?”

 

Cole shrugged. “This bought us some time. We can come up with a plan.”

 

“Yeah, but what is the plan?” Paige asked pointedly.

 

Henry watched his mother, bemused by the experience. His mom still had a bit of temper in his time, and she could still give anyone a tongue-lashing, but the years had definitely softened her towards Cole. It was weird to see how at-odds they had been once.

 

“How about everyone just takes a few minutes to calm down?” Phoebe suggested, exactly as PJ or Parker would have. “We’re all a little… stressed.”

 

Wyatt made an unhappy whine of agreement with the sentiment and Piper bounced him up and down to try calm him. “I need to go put him down,” she announced. “Paige, you go through the Book again, Phoebe, you deal with that,” she pointed to the demon blood stain. “I’ll call Leo once I’m done with Wyatt,” she ordered. “And Cole…”

 

“I’ll go after Kat,” Cole offered, smirking. It had taken a long time before anyone was comfortable leaving him alone with either of Piper’s sisters, or the kids. It was nice to see that they were back to that again.

 

“I could go find Leo,” Matt suggested. “He could be in the Underworld at this point. I can get in and out without any problem.”

 

Piper nodded. “Alright,” she agreed. “Let’s move people.” The attic emptied out of everyone but Henry and Matt.

 

“I’ll come,” Henry offered.

 

Matt shot him a look. “You don’t have to do that. I’m not going to go see him. It’d be too dangerous. For everyone. I know better.”

 

“You’re supposed to know better,” Henry corrected. “But if I had the same chance I know that there would be nothing that could stop me.”

 

Matt shook his head. “I can’t see my dad. It’s too dangerous for everyone. Ryake loves to track people. I don’t need to mess up my future anymore than we already have. I can’t risk him like that. I won’t.”

 

“Leo on the other hand?” Henry teased.

 

Matt rolled his eyes. “That’s different. Leo can shoot lightning from his hands. My dad’s best attempt at that was when he cut the power of the whole street,” he joked. He found it was easiest to remember his dad as a bit of a bumbling dad, rather than the soldier that they all been forced to mold themselves into. Maybe, as a mortal, he could have gotten on with his life, but not with a son who was only half-mortal.

 

The man who had managed to burn water kept his mouth shut under torture to protect his son. Matt couldn’t do anything that would jeopardize that man. He couldn’t take that father away from him, not when he was who he was because of him.

 

Henry nodded in understanding, he squeezed Matt’s arm and pulled away just as Matt shimmered, leaving him alone in the attic of the house that had once been home.

 

He hadn’t lived here full-time, but this was where he had spent every day before and after school. It was where he saw the best and worst of the world. It was a place of pure magic that never made him feel lesser for not having any of his own. It was the home of the Halliwells. Henry might not be a Halliwell, but this place was his home. He was willing to die to protect what it stood for.

 

He glanced around the attic with a sigh. Eyes lingering on the chalk drawing of the time travel portal that had never been fully cleaned. They would succeed. They would save Wyatt. There was no other option.

 

* * *

 

 

The problem with chasing a witchlighter, PJ mused, was that they were very good at escaping tales. She released a huff as Kat spotted her over her shoulder and orbed to another room.

 

“Kat!” PJ exploded, which was a serious outburst for her but was about as alarming as a mortal toddler being in a huff. She threw her hands out in frustration and made a flower vase jiggle, which was about the limit of what she managed to achieve in her ‘rage’. Still, the family knew when PJ was seriously annoyed.

 

Kat orbed back in range with folded arms and a scowl but she did have the grace to look mildly sheepish. “What, PJ? Don’t try tell me to calm down!”

 

PJ shook her head. “No, Kat. Emotions are meant to be felt. They can’t actually hurt you, but repressing them can. But, you can’t let them overcome you, Kat. You can’t be overcome by anger and grief or you’ll put yourself and everyone else at risk. I know that you don’t want that.”

 

Kat scowled even deeper. “You have no clue what I want. I want my sister to be alive.”

 

PJ sighed. “Kat.” She reached out a hand to grab her cousin’s wrist, to pull her into a hug or just to offer tactile comfort - the best kind, in her opinion - when she felt it. She gasped and dropped Kat’s hand like it had burned her. _“Kat,”_ she said, shocked and serious.

 

Kat narrowed her eyes. “I’m sorry, PJ,” she growled. She flung out her hand. “Vase.”

 

PJ didn’t have time to duck or jump out of the way before the vase crashed against her head - her, thankfully, strong head - and she collapsed in the waiting arms of her cousin. Kat pressed her lips to PJ’s head apologetically. “Sorry, PJ,” she murmured again, far more genuine this time. “But I can’t let you stop me. I’m doing this for all of us.”

 

PJ couldn’t respond. The last thing that she was fully aware of was the waves of unending rage and desire to _kill_ from her sweet, fiery cousin focused toward her dangerous but innocent baby cousin.

 

Her last thoughts were a mix of sympathy and fear. Fear for Wyatt. Sympathy for the monstrous actions that grief had pushed Kat to undertake. And fear for Kat too, when Chris or Mel discovered what she was planning to do their brother.


End file.
